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Luis Alvarez: the Ideas Man
CERN Courier March 2012 Commemoration Luis Alvarez: the ideas man The years from the early 1950s to the late 1980s came alive again during a symposium to commemorate the birth of one of the great scientists and inventors of the 20th century. Luis Alvarez – one of the greatest experimental physicists of the 20th century – combined the interests of a scientist, an inventor, a detective and an explorer. He left his mark on areas that ranged from radar through to cosmic rays, nuclear physics, particle accel- erators, detectors and large-scale data analysis, as well as particles and astrophysics. On 19 November, some 200 people gathered at Berkeley to commemorate the 100th anniversary of his birth. Alumni of the Alvarez group – among them physicists, engineers, programmers and bubble-chamber film scanners – were joined by his collaborators, family, present-day students and admirers, as well as scientists whose professional lineage traces back to him. Hosted by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) and the University of California at Berkeley, the symposium reviewed his long career and lasting legacy. A recurring theme of the symposium was, as one speaker put it, a “Shakespeare-type dilemma”: how could one person have accom- plished all of that in one lifetime? Beyond his own initiatives, Alvarez created a culture around him that inspired others to, as George Smoot put it, “think big,” as well as to “think broadly and then deep” and to take risks. Combined with Alvarez’s strong scientific standards and great care in execut- ing them, these principles led directly to the awarding of two Nobel Luis Alvarez celebrating the announcement of his 1968 Nobel prizes in physics to scientists at Berkeley – George Smoot in 2006 prize. -
11/03/11 110311 Pisp.Doc Physics in the Interest of Society 1
1 _11/03/11_ 110311 PISp.doc Physics in the Interest of Society Physics in the Interest of Society Richard L. Garwin IBM Fellow Emeritus IBM, Thomas J. Watson Research Center Yorktown Heights, NY 10598 www.fas.org/RLG/ www.garwin.us [email protected] Inaugural Lecture of the Series Physics in the Interest of Society Massachusetts Institute of Technology November 3, 2011 2 _11/03/11_ 110311 PISp.doc Physics in the Interest of Society In preparing for this lecture I was pleased to reflect on outstanding role models over the decades. But I felt like the centipede that had no difficulty in walking until it began to think which leg to put first. Some of these things are easier to do than they are to describe, much less to analyze. Moreover, a lecture in 2011 is totally different from one of 1990, for instance, because of the instant availability of the Web where you can check or supplement anything I say. It really comes down to the comment of one of Elizabeth Taylor later spouses-to-be, when asked whether he was looking forward to his wedding, and replied, “I know what to do, but can I make it interesting?” I’ll just say first that I think almost all Physics is in the interest of society, but I take the term here to mean advising and consulting, rather than university, national lab, or contractor research. I received my B.S. in physics from what is now Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland in 1947 and went to Chicago with my new wife for graduate study in Physics. -
I. I. Rabi Papers [Finding Aid]. Library of Congress. [PDF Rendered Tue Apr
I. I. Rabi Papers A Finding Aid to the Collection in the Library of Congress Manuscript Division, Library of Congress Washington, D.C. 1992 Revised 2010 March Contact information: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/mss.contact Additional search options available at: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/eadmss.ms998009 LC Online Catalog record: http://lccn.loc.gov/mm89076467 Prepared by Joseph Sullivan with the assistance of Kathleen A. Kelly and John R. Monagle Collection Summary Title: I. I. Rabi Papers Span Dates: 1899-1989 Bulk Dates: (bulk 1945-1968) ID No.: MSS76467 Creator: Rabi, I. I. (Isador Isaac), 1898- Extent: 41,500 items ; 105 cartons plus 1 oversize plus 4 classified ; 42 linear feet Language: Collection material in English Location: Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. Summary: Physicist and educator. The collection documents Rabi's research in physics, particularly in the fields of radar and nuclear energy, leading to the development of lasers, atomic clocks, and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and to his 1944 Nobel Prize in physics; his work as a consultant to the atomic bomb project at Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory and as an advisor on science policy to the United States government, the United Nations, and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization during and after World War II; and his studies, research, and professorships in physics chiefly at Columbia University and also at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Selected Search Terms The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the Library's online catalog. They are grouped by name of person or organization, by subject or location, and by occupation and listed alphabetically therein. -
Enrico Fermi
Fermi, Enrico Inventors and Inventions Enrico Fermi Italian American physicist Fermi helped develop Fermi-Dirac statistics, which liceo (secondary school) and, on the advice of Amidei, elucidate the group behavior of elementary particles. joined the Scuola Normale Superiore at Pisa. This elite He also developed the theory of beta decay and college, attached to the University of Pisa, admitted only discovered neutron-induced artificial radioactivity. forty of Italy’s top students, who were given free board Finally, he succeeded in producing the first sustained and lodging. Fermi performed exceedingly well in the nuclear chain reaction, which led to the discovery highly competitive entrance exam. He completed his of nuclear energy and the development of the university education after only four years of research and atomic bomb. studies, receiving his Ph.D. in physics from the Univer- sity of Pisa and his undergraduate diploma from the Born: September 29, 1901; Rome, Italy Scuola Normale Superiore in July, 1922. He became Died: November 28, 1954; Chicago, Illinois an expert theoretical physicist and a talented exper- Primary field: Physics imentalist. This rare combination provided a solid foun- Primary inventions: Controlled nuclear chain dation for all his subsequent inventions. reaction; Fermi-Dirac statistics; theory of beta decay Life’s Work After postdoctoral work at the University of Göttingen, Early Life in Germany (1922-1923), and the University of Leiden, Enrico Fermi (ehn-REE-koh FUR-mee) was the third in the Netherlands (fall, 1924), Fermi took an interim po- child of Alberto Fermi and Ida de Gattis. Enrico was very sition at the University of Florence in December, 1924. -
Appendix E Nobel Prizes in Nuclear Science
Nuclear Science—A Guide to the Nuclear Science Wall Chart ©2018 Contemporary Physics Education Project (CPEP) Appendix E Nobel Prizes in Nuclear Science Many Nobel Prizes have been awarded for nuclear research and instrumentation. The field has spun off: particle physics, nuclear astrophysics, nuclear power reactors, nuclear medicine, and nuclear weapons. Understanding how the nucleus works and applying that knowledge to technology has been one of the most significant accomplishments of twentieth century scientific research. Each prize was awarded for physics unless otherwise noted. Name(s) Discovery Year Henri Becquerel, Pierre Discovered spontaneous radioactivity 1903 Curie, and Marie Curie Ernest Rutherford Work on the disintegration of the elements and 1908 chemistry of radioactive elements (chem) Marie Curie Discovery of radium and polonium 1911 (chem) Frederick Soddy Work on chemistry of radioactive substances 1921 including the origin and nature of radioactive (chem) isotopes Francis Aston Discovery of isotopes in many non-radioactive 1922 elements, also enunciated the whole-number rule of (chem) atomic masses Charles Wilson Development of the cloud chamber for detecting 1927 charged particles Harold Urey Discovery of heavy hydrogen (deuterium) 1934 (chem) Frederic Joliot and Synthesis of several new radioactive elements 1935 Irene Joliot-Curie (chem) James Chadwick Discovery of the neutron 1935 Carl David Anderson Discovery of the positron 1936 Enrico Fermi New radioactive elements produced by neutron 1938 irradiation Ernest Lawrence -
Wigner's “Unreasonable Effectiveness”
Wigner’s “Unreasonable Effectiveness” in Context José Ferreirós The Mathematical Intelligencer ISSN 0343-6993 Math Intelligencer DOI 10.1007/s00283-017-9719-9 1 23 Your article is protected by copyright and all rights are held exclusively by Springer Science +Business Media New York. This e-offprint is for personal use only and shall not be self- archived in electronic repositories. If you wish to self-archive your article, please use the accepted manuscript version for posting on your own website. You may further deposit the accepted manuscript version in any repository, provided it is only made publicly available 12 months after official publication or later and provided acknowledgement is given to the original source of publication and a link is inserted to the published article on Springer's website. The link must be accompanied by the following text: "The final publication is available at link.springer.com”. 1 23 Author's personal copy Years Ago Jemma Lorenat, Editor instein famously wrote that the most incomprehen- Wigner’s sible thing about the world is that it is comprehen- EE sible. He was thinking about mathematical and the- oretical physics. The idea is an old one. Nobel prize winner ‘‘Unreasonable Paul Dirac believed that mathematics was an especially well-adapted tool to formulate abstract concepts of any kind, and he also famously insisted that mathematical Effectiveness’’ beauty is a key criterion for physical laws.1 But one of the most famous presentations of that thought was by Dirac’s in Context brother-in-law, Wigner Jen´o´ Pa´l, a.k.a. -
EUGENE PAUL WIGNER November 17, 1902–January 1, 1995
NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES E U G ENE PAUL WI G NER 1902—1995 A Biographical Memoir by FR E D E R I C K S E I T Z , E RICH V OG T , A N D AL V I N M. W E I NBER G Any opinions expressed in this memoir are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Academy of Sciences. Biographical Memoir COPYRIGHT 1998 NATIONAL ACADEMIES PRESS WASHINGTON D.C. Courtesy of Atoms for Peace Awards, Inc. EUGENE PAUL WIGNER November 17, 1902–January 1, 1995 BY FREDERICK SEITZ, ERICH VOGT, AND ALVIN M. WEINBERG UGENE WIGNER WAS A towering leader of modern physics Efor more than half of the twentieth century. While his greatest renown was associated with the introduction of sym- metry theory to quantum physics and chemistry, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics for 1963, his scientific work encompassed an astonishing breadth of sci- ence, perhaps unparalleled during his time. In preparing this memoir, we have the impression we are attempting to record the monumental achievements of half a dozen scientists. There is the Wigner who demonstrated that symmetry principles are of great importance in quan- tum mechanics; who pioneered the application of quantum mechanics in the fields of chemical kinetics and the theory of solids; who was the first nuclear engineer; who formu- lated many of the most basic ideas in nuclear physics and nuclear chemistry; who was the prophet of quantum chaos; who served as a mathematician and philosopher of science; and the Wigner who was the supervisor and mentor of more than forty Ph.D. -
52 Annual Greenville County
nd 52 Annual Greenville County and South Carolina Regional 1A Science and Engineering Fair 2006 Sponsored by Rotary Club of Greenville Roper Mountain Science Center and The South Carolina Academy of Science th th st Judging- March 14 , Public Exhibition – March 15 , Award Ceremony - March 21 Palmetto EXPO Center – Greenville, South Carolina For Immediate Release March 7, 2006 Regional Science & Engineering Fair announces new Charles H. Townes Student Research Award GREENVILLE, SC – The Greenville County and South Carolina Regional Science and Engineering Fair announces a new award recognizing a local high school student for excellence in science research. The Charles H. Townes Student Research Award is the top award in the 52nd Annual Greenville County and South Carolina Regional Science & Engineering Fair to be held at the Palmetto Expo Center. The award honors the career of Greenville’s Charles H. Townes, who received the 1964 Nobel prize in Physics for his research leading to the invention of the laser. To encourage our local future scientists Dr. Townes wrote: “Being a scientist can be a wonderful career. Science involves exploration, figuring things out, understanding our universe and ourselves, and new discoveries. We live in an amazing universe, understanding it is fascinating and inspiring, and also leads to new possibilities for humans. Applied science or engineering uses our scientific understanding to provide new tools, solutions to problems, and remarkable improvements in human life. To do good science, it's helpful to learn all one can, be familiar with a variety of fields, and enjoy exploring. The more we know, the better we can fit ideas together to make new ones. -
President Harry S Truman's Office Files, 1945–1953
A Guide to the Microfilm Edition of RESEARCH COLLECTIONS IN AMERICAN POLITICS Microforms from Major Archival and Manuscript Collections General Editor: William E. Leuchtenburg PRESIDENT HARRY S TRUMAN’S OFFICE FILES, 1945–1953 Part 2: Correspondence File UNIVERSITY PUBLICATIONS OF AMERICA A Guide to the Microfilm Edition of RESEARCH COLLECTIONS IN AMERICAN POLITICS Microforms from Major Archival and Manuscript Collections General Editor: William E. Leuchtenburg PRESIDENT HARRY S TRUMAN’S OFFICE FILES, 1945–1953 Part 2: Correspondence File Project Coordinators Gary Hoag Paul Kesaris Robert E. Lester Guide compiled by David W. Loving A microfilm project of UNIVERSITY PUBLICATIONS OF AMERICA An Imprint of CIS 4520 East-West Highway • Bethesda, Maryland 20814-3389 LCCN: 90-956100 Copyright© 1989 by University Publications of America. All rights reserved. ISBN 1-55655-151-7. TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction ............................................................................................................................ v Scope and Content Note ....................................................................................................... xi Source and Editorial Note ..................................................................................................... xiii Reel Index Reel 1 A–Atomic Energy Control Commission, United Nations ......................................... 1 Reel 2 Attlee, Clement R.–Benton, William ........................................................................ 2 Reel 3 Bowles, Chester–Chronological -
Heisenberg's Visit to Niels Bohr in 1941 and the Bohr Letters
Klaus Gottstein Max-Planck-Institut für Physik (Werner-Heisenberg-Institut) Föhringer Ring 6 D-80805 Munich, Germany 26 February, 2002 New insights? Heisenberg’s visit to Niels Bohr in 1941 and the Bohr letters1 The documents recently released by the Niels Bohr Archive do not, in an unambiguous way, solve the enigma of what happened during the critical brief discussion between Bohr and Heisenberg in 1941 which so upset Bohr and made Heisenberg so desperate. But they are interesting, they show what Bohr remembered 15 years later. What Heisenberg remembered was already described by him in his memoirs “Der Teil und das Ganze”. The two descriptions are complementary, they are not incompatible. The two famous physicists, as Hans Bethe called it recently, just talked past each other, starting from different assumptions. They did not finish their conversation. Bohr broke it off before Heisenberg had a chance to complete his intended mission. Heisenberg and Bohr had not seen each other since the beginning of the war in 1939. In the meantime, Heisenberg and some other German physicists had been drafted by Army Ordnance to explore the feasibility of a nuclear bomb which, after the discovery of fission and of the chain reaction, could not be ruled out. How real was this theoretical possibility? By 1941 Heisenberg, after two years of intense theoretical and experimental investigations by the drafted group known as the “Uranium Club”, had reached the conclusion that the construction of a nuclear bomb would be feasible in principle, but technically and economically very difficult. He knew in principle how it could be done, by Uranium isotope separation or by Plutonium production in reactors, but both ways would take many years and would be beyond the means of Germany in time of war, and probably also beyond the means of Germany’s adversaries. -
Enrico Fermi: Genius
ANNIVERSARY Enrico Fermi: genius This year marks the centenary of the birth of Enrico Fermi, one of the giants of 20th- • century science, and one of the last physicists to be both an accomplished experimentalist and an influential theorist. Here, Gianni Battimelli of the University of Rome "La Sapienza" traces the life of a genius. Enrico Fermi was born on 29 September 1901 in Rome to a family with no scientific traditions. His passion for natural sciences, and in particular for physics, was stimulated and guided in his school years by an engineer and family friend, Adolph Amidei, who recognized Fermi's exceptional intellectual abilities and suggested admission to Pisa's Scuola Normale Superiore. After finishing high-school studies in Rome, in 1918 Fermi progressed to the prestigious Pisa Institute, after producing for the admission exam an essay on the characteristics of the propagation of sound, the authenticity of which the commissioners initially refused to believe. Studies at Pisa did not pose any particular difficulties for the young Fermi, despite his having to be largely self-taught using mate rial in foreign languages because nothing existed at the time in Fermi's group discovered the Italian on the new physics emerging around relativity and quantum radioactivity induced by theory. In those years in Italy, these new theories were absent from university teaching, and only mathematicians likeTullio Levi-Civita neutrons, instead of the had the knowledge and insight to see their implications. alpha particles used in the Working alone, between 1919 and 1922, Fermi built up a solid competence in relativity, statistical mechanics and the applications Paris experiments. -
Communications-Mathematics and Applied Mathematics/Download/8110
A Mathematician's Journey to the Edge of the Universe "The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing." ― Socrates Manjunath.R #16/1, 8th Main Road, Shivanagar, Rajajinagar, Bangalore560010, Karnataka, India *Corresponding Author Email: [email protected] *Website: http://www.myw3schools.com/ A Mathematician's Journey to the Edge of the Universe What’s the Ultimate Question? Since the dawn of the history of science from Copernicus (who took the details of Ptolemy, and found a way to look at the same construction from a slightly different perspective and discover that the Earth is not the center of the universe) and Galileo to the present, we (a hoard of talking monkeys who's consciousness is from a collection of connected neurons − hammering away on typewriters and by pure chance eventually ranging the values for the (fundamental) numbers that would allow the development of any form of intelligent life) have gazed at the stars and attempted to chart the heavens and still discovering the fundamental laws of nature often get asked: What is Dark Matter? ... What is Dark Energy? ... What Came Before the Big Bang? ... What's Inside a Black Hole? ... Will the universe continue expanding? Will it just stop or even begin to contract? Are We Alone? Beginning at Stonehenge and ending with the current crisis in String Theory, the story of this eternal question to uncover the mysteries of the universe describes a narrative that includes some of the greatest discoveries of all time and leading personalities, including Aristotle, Johannes Kepler, and Isaac Newton, and the rise to the modern era of Einstein, Eddington, and Hawking.