Bruce Mahan (1930-1982) was born in Connecticut and attended Harvard University as an undergraduate and as a doctoral student. His studies of physical chemistry with George Kistiakowsky, the noted Ukranian-American chemist and Harvard professor, launched a lifelong research interest in gas phase reaction kinetics. Mahan came to the University of California, Berkeley in 1956 and within a few years established a new freshman chemistry course, which remains the basis of many beginning chemistry courses in the United States. In 1965, Mahan wrote a textbook entitled University Chemistry for this course. The textbook sold over 500,000 copies, was translated into eight languages, and became a model upon which many subsequent freshman chemistry textbooks were based. Mahan served as chair of the chemistry department at UC Berkeley from 1968 to 1971. His research interests focused primarily on molecular collisional processes. He was elected to membership in the National Academy of Sciences in 1976.
From the description of Bruce H. Mahan correspondence and manuscripts, 1960-1977. (University of California, Berkeley). WorldCat record id: 82844420
