Kleppner was born in New York City on December 16, 1932, and grew up in nearby New Rochelle, New York.[5] His father was Otto Kleppner, founder of an advertising agency.[6]
Later, he became interested in creating a hydrogen Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC). In 1995, a group of researchers, including Kleppner's former students, made a BEC using rubidium atoms. It was not until 1998 that Kleppner and Tom Greytak finally created a hydrogen BEC.[10] The advancements in cooling technology needed to achieve this contributed to even more precise atomic clocks.[9] Kleppner went on to become one of the founders of a MIT-Harvard joint research lab, the Center for Ultracold Atoms.[9]
Personal life and death
Kleppner married Beatrice Spencer in 1958, and they had three children.[5] They were longtime residents of Belmont, Massachusetts.[11] After falling ill while visiting family in California, Kleppner died at a hospital in Palo Alto on June 16, 2025, at the age of 92.[5][12][13]
Honors and awards
Kleppner was the recipient of many awards including
Within MIT he won the institute's prestigious James R. Killian, Jr. Faculty Achievement Award, conferring him the title of Killian Award Lecturer[18] for 1995-1996.[19]
Kleppner and Robert J. Kolenkow wrote An Introduction to Mechanics in 1973. 40 years later, Kleppner and Kolenkow returned to edit and publish a second edition in 2013.
Kleppner, Daniel (2013). An Introduction to Mechanics (1sted.). Cambridge. ISBN9780511784118.[24]
Kleppner, Daniel (2013). An Introduction to Mechanics (2nded.). Cambridge. ISBN9780521198110.[25]
Kleppner and his thesis adviser (and Nobel laureate) Norman Ramsey wrote the text Quick Calculus, joined for the 3rd edition by MIT professor Peter Dourmashkin:
Kleppner, Daniel; Ramsey, Norman (1972). Quick calculus: for self-study or classroom use (1sted.). New York: Wiley. ISBN9780471491125.
Kleppner, Daniel; Ramsey, Norman (1985). Quick Calculus: a self-teaching guide (2nded.). New York, NY: Wiley. ISBN0471827223.
Kleppner, Daniel; Dourmashkin, Peter; Ramsey, Norman (April 8, 2022). Quick Calculus: A Self-Teaching Guide (3rded.). Jossey-Bass. ISBN978-1-119-74319-4.
Selected publications
Thomas J. Greytak; Daniel Kleppner (2001). "Bose-Einstein Condensation". McGraw-Hill Yearbook of Science and Technology: 64–67.
T. C. Killian; D. G. Fried; C. L. Cesar; A. D. Polycn; T. J. Greytak; D. Kleppner (1996). "Doppler-Free Spectroscopy of Trapped Atomic Hydrogen". Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Atomic Physics.
References
↑Julia Steinberger (2004). Progress towards high precision measurements on ultracold metastable hydrogen and trapping deuterium (PhD thesis). Massachusetts Institute of Technology. hdl:1721.1/28649. OCLC655586822.
