Person

Schrödinger, Prof. Dr. Erwin (12.08.1887 - 04.01.1961)

Austrian physicist.

Erwin Schrödinger attended the Akademisches Gymnasium in Vienna from 1898 to 1906 and went on to study mathematics and physics. In 1910, he was awarded his doctorate under Franz Serafin Exner, and in 1914 he obtained his habilitation at the Vienna Institute of Physics.

After the First World War, during which he was stationed first in South Tyrol and then in Hungary, he worked at the Chair of Theoretical Physics in Zurich and developed the Schrödinger equation, named after him. In 1927, he moved to Berlin as Max Planck’s successor. Following the National Socialists’ seizure of power in 1933, he decided to emigrate to Oxford. There, he was awarded the Nobel Prize, jointly with Paul Dirac, for the discovery of new forms of atomic theory and their applications. In 1936, he was appointed to a chair at the University of Graz and thus returned to Austria. His behaviour during the Anschluss in 1938 is contradictory: although he had already distinguished himself as an opponent of the Nazis whilst in Berlin, he initially assumed he would be able to retain his professorship in Graz. However, the new Nazi leadership stripped him of his professorship; Schrödinger subsequently went to Dublin, where he taught at Trinity College. It was not until 1956 that he returned to Austria and to the University of Vienna and the Institute for Theoretical Physics, where he remained until his death in 1961.
Schrödinger’s most famous thought experiment is known as Schrödinger’s cat, through which he applied principles of quantum mechanics to everyday objects.

His portrait appears on the 1,000-Schilling note issued in 1982.

https://d-nb.info/gnd/118823574

https://viaf.org/viaf/56616247

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/term/BIOG131561

https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q9130

https://ikmk.smb.museum/ndp/person/17539

05.08.2026