Piotr Piecuch

Piotr Piecuch
Piotr Piecuch in Japan in 2012
Born	21 January 1960 Wrocław, Poland
Nationality	United States of America, Canada, Poland
Fields	Theoretical chemistry Quantum chemistry Computational chemistry Theoretical physics Computational Physics Quantum physics
Institutions	Michigan State University
Alma mater	University of Wrocław
Doctoral advisor	Henryk Ratajczak
Known for	Computational methods in quantum chemistry and physics

Piotr Piecuch (born January 21, 1960) is a Polish-born American physical chemist. He holds the title of University Distinguished Professor^[1][2] in the Department of Chemistry at Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, United States. He supervises a group,^[3] whose research focuses on theoretical and computational chemistry as well as theoretical and computational physics, particularly on the development and applications of many-body methods for accurate quantum calculations for molecular systems and atomic nuclei, including methods based on coupled cluster theory, mathematical methods of chemistry and physics, and theory of intermolecular forces. His group is also responsible for the development of the coupled-cluster computer codes incorporated in the widely used GAMESS (US) package.

Education and academic posts

Piecuch studied chemistry at the undergraduate and graduate levels at the University of Wrocław, Poland. He received his M.S. degree in 1983 and Ph.D. degree in 1988. After postdoctoral and research faculty appointments at the University of Waterloo, Canada (1988–91, 1994–95), where he worked with Professors Josef Paldus and Jiri Čížek, University of Arizona (1992–93), where he worked with Professor Ludwik Adamowicz, University of Toronto, Canada (1995–97), where he worked with the recipient of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry,^[4] Professor John C. Polanyi, and University of Florida (1997–98), where he worked with Professor Rodney J. Bartlett, he joined the faculty at Michigan State University as an assistant professor in 1998. He was promoted to an associate professor in 2002 and professor in 2004. He was named a University Distinguished Professor in 2007. While his primary appointment at Michigan State University is with the Department of Chemistry, he has also held adjunct professorship appointments in the Department of Physics and Astronomy (2003–10, 2014-). During his tenure at Michigan State University, he was named a visiting professor at the University of Coimbra, Portugal (2006), Kyoto University, Japan (2005), Institute for Molecular Science, National Institutes of Natural Sciences, in Okazaki, Japan (2012–13), and a Clark Way Harrison Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Washington University in St. Louis, United States (2016).

Research interests and accomplishments

Piecuch has established himself as one the leaders of electronic structure theory. Of particular note are his contributions to coupled-cluster and many-body theories. His work on the renormalized and active-space coupled-cluster methods is especially important, since the resulting approximations, such as CR-CC(2,3), CCSDt, or CC(t;3), and their extensions utilizing the equation-of-motion coupled-cluster concepts, for example, CR-EOMCC, EOMCCSDt, etc., can accurately describe potential energy surfaces, biradicals, and electronic excitations in molecules without resorting to complex multi-reference wave functions.

In general, Piecuch has been among the early and lead developers of multi-reference, response, extended, generalized, and externally corrected coupled-cluster methods, including approximate coupled-pair approaches for strongly correlated systems. His group and collaborators have also implemented linear scaling, local correlation coupled-cluster methods for large systems. The resulting multi-level local schemes that combine higher-level methods, such as CR-CC(2,3), to treat reactive parts of large molecular systems, with lower-order local or canonical methods, such as MP2 or CCSD, to describe chemically inactive regions are particularly valuable.

Although the exponential wave function ansatz of coupled-cluster theory was originally proposed by nuclear physicists, it initially found limited applications in nuclear structure theory. Piecuch and his associates, and their co-workers working in the area of nuclear theory have demonstrated the great utility of quantum-chemistry-inspired coupled-cluster approximations in the field of nuclear physics.

In addition to his coupled-cluster work, Piecuch has made major contributions to fundamental understanding and formal description of intermolecular forces, particularly pairwise non-additive effects, and developed potential energy surface extrapolation schemes based on scaling correlation energies. He has applied theoretical methods to solve many important problems in chemistry and physics. This is exemplified in papers by his group and collaborators on spectroscopy, reaction dynamics, ro-vibrational resonances in van der Waals complexes, several important reaction mechanisms in organic and bioinorganic chemistry, catalysis, and photochemistry.

As of November 3, 2016, his research has resulted in about 200 publications^[5] that according to the Web of Science have received about 9,300 citations and the h-index of 52.^[6] On November 3, 2016, Google Scholar reported around 10,100 citations and the h-index of 56.^[7] In particular, Piecuch's original contributions to coupled-cluster theory, as applied to molecular problems, have been extensively discussed in the scientific literature.^{[8][9][10][11]} His intermolecular forces theory effort has been reviewed by several authors as well.^[12][13] His nuclear coupled-cluster theory research, in addition to being cited in the scientific literature, has received attention in more popular publications.^{[14][15][16][17][18]} As of September 25, 2016, he has given 213 invited lectures at national and international symposia, and academic and research institutions in the United States, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, India, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Tunisia, and United Kingdom.^[19] He has co-edited 6 books and 2 special journal issues, and served on many scientific committees and advisory boards, including the editorial boards of several scientific journals and book series.^[20]

Representative publications

• P. Piecuch, "Spherical Tensor Theory of Long-Range Interactions in a System of N Arbitrary Molecules Including Quantum-Mechanical Many-Body Effects. I. Anisotropic Induction Interactions in the First Three Orders of Perturbation Theory," Mol. Phys. 59, 1067–1083 (1986). doi:10.1080/00268978600102591
• P. Piecuch and J. Paldus, "Orthogonally Spin-Adapted Multi-Reference Hilbert Space Coupled-Cluster Formalism: Diagrammatic Formulation," Theor. Chim. Acta 83, 69-103 (1992). doi:10.1007/BF01113244
• P. Piecuch, N. Oliphant, and L. Adamowicz, "A State-Selective Multi-Reference Coupled-Cluster Theory Employing the Single-Reference Formalism," J. Chem. Phys. 99, 1875–1900 (1993). doi:10.1063/1.466179
• M.S. Topaler, D.G. Truhlar, X.Y. Chang, P. Piecuch, and J.C. Polanyi, "The Photoabsorption Spectrum of the Na…FH van der Waals Molecule. Comparison of Theory and Experiment for a Harpooning Reaction Studied by Transition State Spectroscopy," J. Chem. Phys. 108, 5378-5390 (1998). doi:10.1063/1.475970
• K. Kowalski and P. Piecuch, "The Method of Moments of Coupled-Cluster Equations and the Renormalized CCSD[T], CCSD(T), CCSD(TQ), and CCSDT(Q) Approaches," J. Chem. Phys. 113, 18-35 (2000). doi:10.1063/1.481769
• K. Kowalski and P. Piecuch, "The Active-Space Equation-of-Motion Coupled-Cluster Methods for Excited Electronic States: Full EOMCCSDt," J. Chem. Phys. 115, 643-651 (2001). doi:10.1063/1.1378323
• P. Piecuch, K. Kowalski, P.-D. Fan, and K. Jedziniak, "Exactness of Two-Body Cluster Expansions in Many-Body Quantum Theory," Phys. Rev. Lett. 90, 113001-1 - 113001-4 (2003). doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.90.113001
• M. Wloch, D.J. Dean, J.R. Gour, M. Hjorth-Jensen, K. Kowalski, T. Papenbrock, and P. Piecuch, "Ab Initio Coupled-Cluster Study of ¹⁶O," Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 212501-1 - 212501-4 (2005). doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.94.212501
• P. Piecuch and M. Włoch, "Renormalized Coupled-Cluster Methods Exploiting Left Eigenstates of the Similarity-Transformed Hamiltonian," J. Chem. Phys. 123, 224105-1 - 224105-10 (2005). doi:10.1063/1.2137318
• A. Kinal and P. Piecuch, "Is the Mechanism of the [2+2] Cycloaddition of Cyclopentyne to Ethylene Concerted or Biradical? A Completely Renormalized Coupled Cluster Study," J. Phys. Chem. A 110, 367-378 (2006). doi:10.1021/jp0513216
• W. Li and P. Piecuch, "Multi-level Extension of the Cluster-In-Molecule Local Correlation Methodology: Merging Coupled-Cluster and Møller–Plesset Perturbation Theories," J. Phys. Chem. A 114, 6721-6727 (2010). doi:10.1021/jp1038738
• J. Shen and P. Piecuch, "Combining Active-Space Coupled-Cluster Methods with Moment Energy Corrections via the CC(P;Q) Methodology, with Benchmark Calculations for Biradical Transition States," J. Chem. Phys. 136, 144104-1 - 144104-16 (2012). doi:10.1063/1.3700802
• P. Piecuch, J.A. Hansen, D. Staedter, S. Faure, and V. Blanchet, "Communication: Existence of the Doubly Excited State that Mediates the Photoionization of Azulene," J. Chem. Phys. 138, 201102-1 - 201102-4 (2013). doi:10.1063/1.4808014

Awards and honors

Piecuch is an elected Distinguished Fellow of the Kosciuszko Foundation Collegium of Eminent Scientists (2015),^[21][22][23] an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2011),^[24][25][26] an elected Fellow of the American Physical Society (2008),^[27][28][29] an Elected Member of the European Academy of Sciences, Arts and Humanities^[30] in Paris, France (2003), and a recipient of a number of other awards and honors, including, in addition to the title of the University Distinguished Professor that he received in 2007, the S.R. Palit Memorial Lecture at the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (Kolkata, India, 2007),^[31][32] the Invitation Fellowship of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (2005), the QSCP^[33] Promising Scientist Prize of Centre de Mécanique Ondulatoire Appliquée, France, for "Scientific and Human Endeavour and Achievement" (2004),^[34] the Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship (2002–2004),^[35][36] the Wiley–International Journal of Quantum Chemistry Young Investigator Award (2000),^[37] three awards from the Polish Chemical Society for Research (1983, 1986, 1992), the award from the Minister of National Education of Poland (1989), and two awards from the Polish Academy of Sciences (1982).

Personal life

Piecuch was born in Wrocław, Poland to Telesfor and Hanna Piecuch, and has one sister, Katarzyna. He is married to Jolanta Piecuch (maiden name Sanetra). They have one child, Anna Piecuch.

References

1. "Ten MSU professors named University Distinguished Professors".
2. "YouTube video link "Michigan State University: Professor of Chemistry Piotr Piecuch".".
3. "Piecuch research group".
4. "The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1986: Dudley R. Herschbach, Yuan T. Lee, John C. Polanyi".
5. "Piotr Piecuch's Publications" (PDF).
6. "Piotr Piecuch's ResearcherID profile".
7. "Piotr Piecuch's Google Scholar profile".
8. Paldus, Josef; Li, Xiangzhu (1999). "A critical assessment of coupled cluster method in quantum chemistry". Advances in Chemical Physics. 110: 1. doi:10.1002/9780470141694.ch1.
9. Bartlett, Rodney J.; Musiał, Monika (2007). "Coupled-cluster theory in quantum chemistry". Reviews of Modern Physics. 79 (1): 291. doi:10.1103/RevModPhys.79.291.
10. Jeziorski, Bogumil (2012). "Multireference coupled-cluster ansatz". Molecular Physics. 108 (21-23): 3043. doi:10.1080/00268976.2010.524169.
11. Lyakh, Dmitry I.; Musiał, Monika; Lotrich, Victor F.; Bartlett, Rodney J. (2012). "Multireference nature of chemistry: The coupled-cluster view". Chemical Reviews. 112 (1): 182. doi:10.1021/cr2001417.
12. Chalasinski, Grzegorz; Gutowski, Maciej (1988). "Weak interactions between small systems. Models for studying the nature of intermolecular forces and challenging problems for ab initio calculations". Chemical Reviews. 88 (6): 943. doi:10.1021/cr00088a007.
13. Jeziorski, Bogumil; Moszynski, Robert; Szalewicz, Krzysztof. "Perturbation theory approach to intermolecular potential energy surfaces of van der Waals complexes". Chemical Reviews. 94 (7): 1887. doi:10.1021/cr00031a008.
14. ""Physicists wipe away complexity for a clearer view of heavy nuclei", AAAS EurekAlert, March 14, 2007".
15. ""Coupled-clusters point to faster computation", CERN Courier, May 1, 2007".
16. ""MSU prof provides insight on atomic nuclei", by Matthew Miller, Lansing State Journal, April 23, 2007".
17. ""Beyond the nuclear shell model", Physics Today, November 2007, page 48".
18. ""Physicists wipe away complexity for a clearer view of atomic nuclei", MSU News, March 15, 2007".
19. "Piotr Piecuch's Publications, Talks, and Conference Presentations" (PDF).
20. "Piotr Piecuch's Curriculum Vitae" (PDF).
21. "List of Kosciuszko Foundation Collegium of Eminent Scientists".
22. "MSU chemistry professor named distinguished fellow".
23. "MSU chemistry professor named distinguished fellow, MSU Today".
24. "AAAS News and Notes: AAAS Members Elected as Fellows". Science. 334 (6063): 1659. doi:10.1126/science.334.6063.1659.
25. "MSU earns record number of AAAS Fellows".
26. "List of AAAS Fellows".
27. "APS Fellows nominated by Division of Chemical Physics".
28. "APS annuonces spring 2009 prize and award recipients" (PDF).
29. "List of APS Fellows".
30. "European Academy of Sciences, Arts and Humanities".
31. "Professor S.R. Palit memorial lecture".
32. "Different moments of Professor S.R. Palit Memorial Lecture delivered by Prof. Piotr Piecuch".
33. Maruani, Jean (2009). "An illustrated overview of the origins and development of the QSCP meetings". Progress in Theoretical Chemistry and Physics. 19: 3. doi:10.1007/978-90-481-2596-8_1.
34. "QSCP Promising Scientist Award of CMOA, Les Houches 2004".
35. "Alfred P. Sloan Foundation 2002 Annual Report" (PDF).
36. "Past Alfred P. Sloan Fellows".
37. "Wiley-IJQC Young Investigators Previous Award Winners" (PDF).

External resources

• Piotr Piecuch's MSU profile