Biography:Hajo Leschke

Hajo Leschke (born 11 February 1945 in Wentorf bei Hamburg) is a German mathematical physicist and (semi-)retired professor of theoretical physics at the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU). He is probably best known for notable rigorous results on some model systems in quantum (statistical) mechanics obtained by functional-analytic and probabilistic techniques, jointly with his (former) students and other co-workers. His research topics include: Peierls Transition, Functional Formulations of Quantum and Stochastic Dynamics, Pekar–Fröhlich Polaron, Quantum Spin Chains, Feynman–Kac Formulas, (Random) Schrödinger Operators, Landau-Level Broadening, Lifschitz Tails, Anderson Localization, Fermionic Entanglement Entropies, Quantum Spin Glasses.

Hajo Leschke on 4 April 2023 at the FAU in Erlangen, Staudtstraße

Academic education

Leschke studied physics and mathematics at the Universität Hamburg and graduated with a diploma in physics (1970). The underlying thesis was supervised by Wolfgang Kundt (born 1931). He received his doctorate in physics (1975) with dissertation supervisor Uwe Brandt (1944–1997) at the (Technische) Universität Dortmund, where he also earned the habilitation in physics (1981). His studies were supported by the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes (German Academic Scholarship Foundation) and by a Kurt-Hartwig-Siemers–Wissenschaftspreis on the recommendation of Werner Döring (1911-2006) and of Pascual Jordan (1902-1980), respectively.

Professional experience

Leschke was a research (and teaching) assistant to Ludwig Tewordt (1926–2016) at the Universität Hamburg, to Uwe Brandt at the Universität Dortmund, to Herbert Wagner (born 1935) at the Forschungszentrum Jülich (then: KFA Jülich), and to Richard Bausch (born 1935) at the (Heinrich-Heine–)Universität Düsseldorf (HHU) before he became a professor there in 1982 and at the FAU in 1983. From 1998 to 2011 Leschke belonged to the advisory board of the Annalen der Physik, then edited by Ulrich Eckern (born 1952) at the Universität Augsburg. It is one of the oldest scientific journals on physics.

In academia internationally esteemed former students

Leschke's diploma and doctoral students Peter Müller (born 1967) and Simone Warzel (born 1973) are professors of mathematics in München/Garching at the Ludwig-Maximilians–Universität (LMU) and the Technische Universität (TUM), respectively. Also his diploma students Dirk Hundertmark (born 1965) and Bernhard G. Bodmann (born 1972) are professors of mathematics at the Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT) and the University of Houston Texas (UH), respectively.

Selected publications since 2000

• B.K. Chakrabarti, H. Leschke, P. Ray, T. Shirai, S. Tanaka; Quantum annealing and computation: challenges and perspectives (Editors' introduction to the Theme Issue 2241), Phil. Trans. Roy Soc.(London) A 381, 20210419, 5pp. (2023); DOI: 10.1098/rsta.2021.0419

• H. Leschke, C. Manai, R. Ruder, S. Warzel; Existence of replica-symmetry breaking in quantum glasses, Phys. Rev. Lett. 127, 207204, 6pp. (2021); DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.127.207204

• H. Leschke, S. Rothlauf, R. Ruder, W. Spitzer; The free energy of a quantum spin-glass model for weak disorder, J. Stat. Phys. 182, 55, 41pp. (2021); DOI: 10.1007/s10955-020-02689-8

• H. Leschke, A.V. Sobolev, W. Spitzer; Trace formulas for Wiener-Hopf operators with applications to entropies of free fermionic equilibrium states, J. Funct. Anal. 273, 1049–1094 (2017); DOI: 10.1016/j.jfa.2017.04.005

• H. Leschke, A.V. Sobolev, W. Spitzer; Scaling of Rényi entanglement entropies of the free Fermi-gas ground state: a rigorous proof, Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 160403, 5pp. (2014); DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.112.160403

• K. Broderix, H. Leschke, P. Müller; Continuous integral kernels for unbounded Schrödinger semigroups and their spectral projections, J. Funct. Anal. 212, 287–323 (2004); DOI: 10.1016/j.jfa.2004.01.009

• H. Leschke, S. Warzel; Quantum-classical transitions in Lifshitz tails with magnetic fields, Phys. Rev. Lett. 92, 086402, 4pp. (2004); DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.92.086402

• T. Hupfer, H. Leschke, P. Müller, S. Warzel; The absolute continuity of the integrated density of states for magnetic Schrödinger operators with certain unbounded random potentials, Commun. Math. Phys. 221, 229–254 (2001); DOI: 10.1007/s002200100467

• W. Fischer, H. Leschke, P. Müller; Spectral localization by Gaussian random potentials in multi-dimensional continuous space, J. Stat. Phys. 101, 935–985 (2000); DOI: 10.1023/A:1026425621261

• K. Broderix, D. Hundertmark, H. Leschke; Continuity properties of Schrödinger semigroups with magnetic fields, Rev. Math. Phys. 12, 181–225 (2000); DOI: 10.1142/S0129055X00000083

• H. Fink, H. Leschke; Is the universe a quantum system?, Found. Phys. Lett. 13, 345–356 (2000); DOI: 10.1023/A:1007819627255

External links

• Homepage at the FAU
• Hajo Leschke at the Mathematical Genealogy Project (MGP), supplementing his entry at the Academic Genealogy of Theoretical Physicists via Arnold Sommerfeld (1868-1951) and Walter Franz (1911-1992)