Johannes Diderik van der Waals was a Dutch theoretical physicist who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1910 "for his work on the equation of state for gases and liquids." Van der Waals started his career as a schoolteacher, before becoming the first physics professor of the University of Amsterdam when its status was upgraded to Municipal University in 1877. The Nobel Prize in Physics 1910, announced November 5, 1910. Johannes Diderik van der Waals, “for his work on the equation of state for gases and liquids”. Johannes Diderik van der Waals: born 1837, Leiden, the Netherlands. Wiki link Data: the Nobel Foundation (CC0).