Charles Kittel (born 18.07.1916) is an American theoretical physicist and a member of the National Academy of Sciences (1957). He was born in New York. He graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Cambridge (1938). In 1947 — 50 he worked at the Bell Telephone Laboratories. From 1951 he has been professor at the University of California (Berkeley).
His research was in the field of solid-state physics, magnetism, low-temperature physics, quantum theory and statistical physics. He contributed to the application of magnetic resonance methods to the study of the electronic structure of solids. In 1951 he developed a phenomenological theory of antiferroelectricity and a theory of antiferromagnetic resonance. With Y. Yafet he generalised in 1952 Néel's theory of ferromagnetism (the Yafet–Kittel model). He discovered (1953) cyclotron resonance and proposed (1958) a new method of obtaining temperatures below 1 K. In 1951 he constructed a theory of spin waves in ferromagnetic media (together with C. Herring), and in 1960 a theory of first-order magnetic phase transitions (Kittel's theory). He predicted (1961) the spin-phonon interaction in paramagnetic crystals.