John Robert Schrieffer (1931–2019) was an American physicist best known for his significant contributions to the field of condensed matter physics, particularly for co-developing the Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) theory of superconductivity. This theory, formulated in 1957 along with John Bardeen and Leon Cooper, explains how certain materials can conduct electricity without resistance at low temperatures.
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John Robert Schrieffer coauthored the microscopic BCS theory of conventional superconductivity. Its many-electron ground state coherently combines configurations in which states of opposite spin and momentum are paired. An attractive interaction mediated by lattice vibrations can lower the energy of this collective state, while its excitations have a gap. The theory relates that construction to a phase transition, specific heat, magnetic-field penetration and other measurable properties of a superconductor.[ref]
Theory of Superconductivity by John Bardeen and others. Physical Review 108, 1175 (1957), paired ground state and observable predictions
Portrait of John Robert Schrieffer
. Unknown author; Nationaal Archief / Spaarnestad Photo, ANEFO collection. CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Source.