Richard R. Ernst was a renowned Swiss physical chemist who made transformative contributions to the field of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Born on August 14, 1933, in Winterthur, Switzerland, he earned both his B.A. in chemistry in 1957 and Ph.D. in physical chemistry in 1962 from the Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich. Following his doctoral studies, Ernst worked as a research chemist at Varian Associates in Palo Alto, California from 1963 to 1968, where he began his pioneering work on NMR techniques. He returned to his alma mater in 1968, becoming an assistant professor in 1970 and rising to full professor of physical chemistry in 1976, a position he held until his retirement in 1998. Ernst remained an influential figure in the scientific community throughout his career, directing a research group dedicated to magnetic resonance spectroscopy at ETH Zurich.
Ernst's most significant scientific achievement was his revolutionary development of Fourier transform nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1991. In 1966, working with colleague Weston Anderson, he discovered that replacing the slow, sweeping radio waves traditionally used in NMR with short, intense pulses dramatically increased the technique's sensitivity by up to 100 fold. This breakthrough, known as Fourier transform NMR, transformed NMR from a frequency domain to a time domain technique, enabling the study of previously inaccessible nuclei and smaller sample quantities. During the mid 1970s, Ernst further advanced the field by developing two dimensional NMR techniques, which added a second dimension to spectroscopy and enabled the analysis of exceedingly large molecules. These innovations became fundamental tools that allowed scientists to determine the three dimensional structures of complex biomolecules such as proteins and to study molecular interactions with unprecedented detail.
Ernst's methodological contributions to NMR spectroscopy extended far beyond chemistry, profoundly impacting physics, biochemistry, and medicine, particularly through the development of magnetic resonance imaging. He humbly described himself as a tool maker rather than a scientist, emphasizing his focus on developing practical methodologies that empowered researchers across multiple disciplines. His collaborative work with Professor Kurt Wüthrich at ETH Zurich was instrumental in advancing the NMR structure determination of biopolymers in solution, enabling the field to determine three dimensional structures of biomolecules in their natural environment. The techniques Ernst pioneered became indispensable in pharmaceutical research, materials science, and medical diagnostics, with Fourier transform and two dimensional NMR establishing the foundation for modern structural biology. Richard R. Ernst passed away on June 4, 2021, leaving behind a legacy as one of the most influential method developers in modern chemistry whose tools continue to drive scientific discovery across numerous fields.
