Person: Animalu, Alexander
Alexander Animalu is a Nigerian theoretical physicist known for his work in superconductivity and solar energy.
Mathematical Profile (Excerpt):
- After attending these three Church Mission Society primary schools, Alexander progressed to secondary education and attended Dennis Memorial Grammar School (1952-58).
- During the period that Animalu attended the Memorial Grammar School, its principals were Rev P J Ross (1952-54) and S J Cookey (1954-59).
- Animalu earned Grade 1 in the West African School Certificate in 1956 and, specialising in science subjects, a Cambridge Higher School Certificate in 1958.
- We note that Animalu graduated from the University of Ibadan in the year it became an independent university so he was one of the last students at the University to be awarded a University of London degree.
- When he was Animalu's advisor he was a member of a Theory Group at the Cavendish Laboratory and Animalu also became a memebr of the Cavendish Laboratory.
- The quality and speed with which Animalu produced research was truly remarkable.
- In July 1965 Animalu and his thesis advisor Volker Heine submitted a joint paper, The screened model potential for 25 elements to the Philosophical Magazine.
- The calculations are a continuation of the work by Heine and Abarenkov (1964), using the screening theory of Animalu (Non-local dielectric screening in metals).
- Animalu continued with this work with his single-authored paper The total electronic band structure energy for 29 elements being published by the Royal Society of London in 1966.
- During these years Animalu published many significant papers, almost all of which are single author papers.
- Animalu writes, "This work was completed, supported in part by the Advanced Research Projects Agency through the Center for Materials Research, Stanford University, Stanford, California]; Many-electron effects in the optical conductivity of simple metals by Kubo formula (1970); General theory of magnetic-field-induced surface states (1970); Mass ratio of quarks (1971); Charge spectrum of four-component fields with O(4, 2) symmetry (1971); Bound states and mass spectra of hadrons in the quark model (1971); Scale symmetry (1972); Lepton and hadron currents in O(4, 2) current algebra (1972); High-field magnetoresistance of metals by Kubo-Mott formula (1972); Pseudopotential approach to magnetic energy bandstructure and magnetic breakdown in metals (1972); Josephson current in tunneling between coupled superconductors (1973); A relativistic model of quark-quark strong interactions (1973); Electronic structure of transition metals.
- In 1977 Animalu published the book Intermediate Quantum Theory of Crystalline Solids.
- Animalu has written a good book, and it would be unfortunate if it were to suffer this fate.
- Animalu sensibly emphasizes the magnitudes of physical quantities involved in his exposition, and he gives useful tables of physical quantities for particular substances.
- Professor Animalu was the 1990 Ahiajoku lecturer, the highest Igbo academic forum.
- Professor Animalu was appointed Director and Chief Executive of the National Mathematical Centre, Abuja, holding the position from April 1999 to January 2001.
- For his contributions to national development, Professor Animalu received the 2000 Nigerian National Order of Merit Award for Basic Science.
- Professor Animalu is author of numerous scientific articles in refereed journals and more than 30 books in both the sciences and the humanities, including the biographies of the Rt Hon Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe, Professor Chike Obi, Professor Kenneth Dike, Professor Samuel Okoye, Professor James Ezeilo, Professor Chukwuedu Nwokolo and Professor Agodi Onwumechili among others.
Born 28 August 1938, Oba, Idemili South Local Government Area of Anambra State, Nigeria.
View full biography at MacTutor
Tags relevant for this person:
African, Origin Nigeria
Thank you to the contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0! 
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- @J-J-O'Connor
- @E-F-Robertson
References
Adapted from other CC BY-SA 4.0 Sources:
- O’Connor, John J; Robertson, Edmund F: MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive
