Andrew Keller


Andrew Keller FRS was a British polymer scientist. He was Research Professor in Polymer Science, Department of Physics, University of Bristol, 1969–91, then Professor Emeritus.

Education and early life

He was born Andras Keller in Budapest in 1925, the only child of Jewish parents. His scientific education began in 1943 when he entered the University of Budapest, earning his BSc in chemistry cum laude in 1947. He began his PhD studies at the same university but his path to world recognition in the field of polymer science was interrupted by the rapidly deteriorating political situation in Hungary in 1948, which caused him to abruptly depart that country. He moved to United Kingdom and took position with Imperial Chemical Industries Ltd in Manchester, as technical officer in the Polymers Division. He became a naturalised citizen of the UK in 1953. In 1955, he moved to the University of Bristol Physics Department as Research Assistant heading a team financed by the Ministry of Supply. At Bristol, he began to further develop his ideas on crystallisation, and obtained his PhD there in 1958.

Career

With the encouragement of the head of the Physics Department, Professor Frederick Charles Frank, Keller stayed on at Bristol, being appointed Lecturer in Physics in 1963, Reader in 1965, and Research Professor in Polymer Science in 1969.
He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1972 and won its Rumford Medal in 1994.
He was elected a member of Academia Europaea in 1994. Other recognition included the High Polymer Physics Prize of the American Physical Society, the Swinburn Medal of the Plastics and Rubber Institute and the Max Born Prize of Physics. In 1998, he became a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.