Daniel C. Tsui (PhD, Nobel)

Dr. Daniel Chee Tsui, a Chinese-born American physicist, shared the 1998 Nobel Prize in Physics for the discovery of the fractional quantum Hall effect. This has been an active area of semiconductor related research over the past 40 years, inspiring new theories and discoveries. Tsui was born into a poor Chinese farming family in Henan, China, later immigrating to the U.S. where he attended Augustana College in Illinois. Tsui graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1961, the only student of Chinese descent in the college. He completed his PhD. in physics in 1967 at the University of Chicago. From there, he joined Bell Labs, later spending 28 years as a faculty member at Princeton. His time at Augustana College was a period of introspection when he said: "It was there (Augustana College) that I had for the first time the leisure to wrestle with my Lutheran faith and to think through and make some sense out of my life experience." While attending college, Dan was noted as an active participant in Lutheran fellowship, the Student Association and the Society for Christian Missions. Thomas Benson, a classmate and close friend, recalls that scripture and music were staples in his spiritual life.