Willem Hendrik Keesom, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death

Willem Hendrik Keesom

Dutch physicist

Date of Birth: 21-Jun-1876

Place of Birth: Texel, North Holland, Netherlands

Date of Death: 24-Mar-1956

Profession: physicist, university teacher

Nationality: Kingdom of the Netherlands

Zodiac Sign: Cancer

Willem Hendrik Keesom () (21 June 1876, Texel – 24 March 1956, Leiden) was a Dutch physicist who, in 1926, invented a method to freeze liquid helium. He also developed the first mathematical description of dipole–dipole interactions in 1921.
Thus, dipole–dipole interactions are also known as Keesom interactions. He was previously a student of Heike Kamerlingh Onnes, who had discovered superconductivity (a feat for which Kamerlingh Onnes received the 1913 Nobel Prize in Physics).
He also discovered the lambda-point transition specific-heat maximum between Helium-I and Helium-2 in 1930 (Basic Superfluids p25/Tony Guenault). In 1924 he became member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.
In 1966, the minor planet 9686 Keesom was named after him.