Lothar Wolfgang Nordheim (born 7.11.1899) is a theoretical physicist. He was born in Munich. In 1923 he received the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Göttingen, where he was a lecturer in 1928-33. In 1935-37 he was professor at Purdue University, in 1937 —56 professor at Duke University, and in 1956 — 68 a physicist and head of the theoretical physics department of the General Atomic Company (San Diego).
His work was in quantum mechanics, solid-state physics, nuclear physics, neutron physics and reactor physics. In 1928 he explained the phenomenon of cold emission of electrons from metals on the basis of electron tunnelling (the Fowler–Nordheim model). Independently of others, he applied (1932) the idea of quantum-mechanical tunnelling to the treatment of rectification at a metal–semiconductor contact.
In 1934 Nordheim and W. Heitler predicted the existence of Compton processes of higher orders. He studied the diffusion, moderation and multiplication of neutrons and proposed a method of calculating the effectiveness of a control rod of a nuclear reactor (the Nordheim–Scalettar method). In 1951 he formulated empirical rules that make it possible to give the spins of a large number of odd-odd nuclei correctly (the Nordheim rules).