Théophile de Donder

Théophile Ernest de Donder (1872–1957) was a Belgian mathematician and physicist. He was famous for work in making connections between the concepts of chemical affinity and free energy. He is said to have been the first to address the thermodynamics of irreversible processes. De Donder’s work was later developed further by Ilya Prigogine. De Donder was an associate and friend of Albert Einstein.