Prominent Turkish scholar Oktay Sinano?lu dies at age 80

Prof. Oktay Sinano?lu, one of Turkey?s most prominent scholars who was known for his books on the Turkish language and became Yale University?s youngest professor of the 20th century, died early April 20 in the United States.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavu?o?lu tweeted on April 20 that Sinano?lu, who was born in the city of Bari in Italy in 1934, had passed away in Miami.

?May God rest Prof. Oktay Sinano?lu?s soul in peace. Our Miami Consulate General is following the necessary process to bring his body to our country,? read Çavu?o?lu?s tweet on April 20.

Sinano?lu received various awards and scholarships from internationally prestigious institutions and was nominated twice for the Nobel Prize for his works in the field of chemistry. 

Sinano?lu, who had finished TED Ankara Private High School in Ankara with a first degree, graduated from Berkeley University?s chemical engineering department in California at the top of his class in 1956. 

Only eight months after he started his studies, Sinano?lu earned his master?s degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1957 and later earned a PhD on theoretical chemistry from Berkeley in 1959. 

He became an assistant professor at Yale in 1960, then an associate professor in 1961 for his ?Many Electron Theory of Atoms and Molecules.? 

At the age of 28, Sinano?lu became a full professor in 1963 for solving a mathematics theory that had remained unsolved for 50 years, thus marking him as the youngest academic of the 20th century to be granted this title at Yale. 

He was the first person to receive the ?Alexander von Humboldt Research Award? from the German state in 1973, while he got the ?International Outstanding Scientist Award? from...