Ahmed zewail story

Ahmed zewail children

Ahmed Zewail was an Egyptian scientist, known as the "father of femtochemistry". He won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work on femtochemistry and became the first Egyptian scientist who won Nobel Prize in a scientific field. Ahmed and I were close — at least that is what I always felt — he called me his big brother I was one year his senior.

While I was more direct about most things, even personal matters, he was generally more difficult to read out and, everybody I know agrees, intrinsically quite private. However, we shared the same sense of humor and the same curious, I would say almost childlike, mindset, when approaching scientific problems — though his was that of a genius.

Ahmed was despite his deeper felt reservation, very social, with an eye for everybody, whether janitor or Nobel laureate. To really see people is something I think I learnt very much from him and indeed find very important in life. His social ability was always combined with humor: I remember many a good laugh together. At the same time he was reflective and a deep philosopher — often finding scholarly parallels with ancient Egyptian or Greek science.

We met more frequently after his Nobel prize, when our families had got to know each other in Stockholm. Actually, the first time we met was only some five years before the prize.