Obituary of Morris Krauss

Morris (Mo) Krauss, retired Distinguished Scientist from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (formerly the National Bureau of Standards) passed away on May 29, 2009.

Mo Krauss was born in 1932 and graduated from Stuyvesant High School in New York City in 1948. In 1951 he married Joy Beck who remained his beloved companion until his death and who died herself just two weeks later. After he received a B.S. in Chemistry from City College of New York in 1952, he and Joy traveled to Salt Lake City, where he was a student with Austin L. Wahrhaftig at the University of Utah. He earned his Ph.D. in Chemistry in 1955.

After receiving his Ph.D., Mo joined the National Bureau of Standards (NBS), first as a postdoctoral fellow and then as a research scientist until his retirement in 2004. While at NBS, Mo founded and led the Quantum Chemistry Group from the mid 1970’s through the mid 1990’s. He was named a NBS Fellow in 1983 and was awarded the NBS Stratton Award for outstanding research accomplishments in 1984. He was awarded the Department of Commerce Silver Medal in 1965 and the Gold Medal in 1984. In 1993, He was named a Fellow of the Center for Advanced Research in Biotechnology, a joint institute of the University of Maryland and the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

Mo’s outstanding career influenced many aspects of theoretical and computational chemistry. His strength lay in his ability to combine his personal chemical and physical insight with appropriate computation to answer practical questions in a wide range of disciplines. For half a century, he published over 200 research papers covering the development of theoretical models and computational algorithms, and the applications of theory to problems in spectroscopy, atmospheric chemistry, astronomy, laser and photochemistry, enzyme mechanisms and the electronic structure of biomolecules. Two of his publications received more than 1000 citations each. Over the course of his career as computers improved he was able to progress from simple diatomic molecules through heavy atom chemistry and finally into the large molecular systems characteristic of molecular biology. Long after most scientists slow down in their efforts, Mo was as active at the end of his career as he was in the beginning.

Mo was a leader in the development of effective core potentials in Quantum Chemistry and their application to structures and properties of molecules containing heavy atoms. He collaborated extensively with theoreticians and experimentalists around the world. His publications list over 100 coauthors testifying to the many benefits of working with him. He was as charming as he was challenging. His many friends and colleagues will remember him as a person who loved good food, good wine, and a good argument, and who was as passionate about politics as he was about science. He will be greatly missed.