Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research


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Prof. Dr. Kurt Kremer


Kurt Kremer


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Prof. Kremer joined the Max-Planck Society in September of 1995 as the sixth director of the Max-Planck Institute for Polymer Research, heading the new theory group. He studied physics at the University of Cologne. In 1983 he received his PhD degree in theoretical physics from the University of Cologne under the supervision of Prof. Binder at the National Research Center KFA Jülich. He performed computer simulations for dynamic and static properties of polymers in bulk and near surfaces. After spending another year at Jülich as a scientific staff member he moved for a post doctoral stay to Exxon Research and Engineering Corporation, Annandale, New Jersey, USA. There, he started working on molecular dynamics simulations of polymers and on charge stabilized colloids in collaboration with Drs. Grest, Pincus, and others. In 1985 he came back to Germany becoming a member of Prof. Binder's group at the University of Mainz as an Assistant Professor of theoretical physics. There he got his Habilitation in 1988. After that he returned to the solid state laboratory of the KFA Jülich as a senior scientific staff member joining the group of Prof. Villain. In 1992 his Habilitation was transferred to the University of Bonn and in fall of 1995 back to Mainz. He spent several extended visits as visiting professor/scientist at Exxon Research (Dr. Grest), UC Santa Barbara (Materials Dept., Prof. Pincus), and University of Minnesota (Dept. Chem. Engineering and Materials Science, Profs. Davis, Bates, Tirell, and others). In spring 1995 he stayed for a period of three months at the central research department of the Bayer AG, Leverkusen, looking into the applicability of current theoretical results to industrial problems.

Prof. Kremer was awarded the ''George T. Piercy Distinguished Professorship of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science'' of the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, in 1991 and the ''Walter Schottky Preis der Deutschen Physikalischen Gesellschaft'' in 1992. In 1999 he was Whitby Lecturer at Akron University, and in 2006 Nakamura Lecturer at UC Santa Barbara. Since 2006 he is Fellow of the American Physical Society. Together with G. S. Grest he is the 2011 recipient of the Polymer Physics Prize of the American Physical Society.

His research mainly employed various computer simulation techniques to a variety of different problems in the general area of soft matter physics in close relation to either experiment or analytic theory or both. This covers models which contain some or all local chemical details as well as highly idealized models. Specific current research areas of the theory group include:

computational physics methods/ applications
statistical mechanics of soft matter (polymers, colloids, membranes)
polyelectrolytes
theory of complex fluids
multiscale modeling, structure property relations
multiscale modeling of soft matter electronics and of biological soft matter


The following senior staff scientists interact closely with Prof. Dr. Kremer in the above research areas:

Dr. D. Andrienko (molecular electronics, multiscale modelling)
PD Dr. L. Delle Site (Ab initio Molecular Dynamics, CPMD, Multiscale Modeling)
Dr. D. Donadio Independent Max Planck Research Group (transport phenomena in hard and soft matter)
Prof Dr. B. Dünweg ((hybrid) computer simulation methods, statistical mechanics)
Dr. C. Peter Emmy Noether Fellow (biological soft matter)
Prof. Dr. H. Pleiner (macroscopic theory, liquid crystals)
Dr. T. Stühn (software development, computing infrastructure)
Prof. Dr. T. A. Vilgis (analytic theory, networks, polyelectrolytes, disordered systems)


Max Planck Institue for Polymer Research Theory group at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research
Last update Jan, 13th 2011 by T. Stühn/D. Kirsch