Alvin H. Nielsen (30 May 1910 – 3 November 1994) was an American physicist in molecular spectroscopy.
Nielsen was born in Menominee, Michigan.[1] He graduated from the University of Michigan, taught at the Ohio State University, and then relocated to the University of Tennessee in 1935.[1] He spent 1951 to 1952 at the Astrophysical Institute in Liège.[1] Nielsen achieved widespread recognition for his work in spectroscopy and wrote eighty-five publications. He served as chairman of the physics department at the University of Tennessee.[1] He was the brother of Harald Herborg Nielsen.[1]
In 1980, the University of Tennessee at Knoxville named its physics building the Alvin H. Nielsen Physics Building in Nielsen's honor.