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Volume 48, Number 3, May–June 2011 The birth of nuclear physics Measuring Rutherford’s impact on science Is Einstein still right? New cosmological tests of General Relativity )*)& -+.," /-+)"/"-.*! +)&*"! )* +*#+ (30+-". "* ".1./"). /+)& +- "& -+. +,". **&*$0**"(&*$& -+. +,". )* .1./"). *+)& -+. ("*./-0)"*/"!*!"*//&+* *+)& -+) -+ -/ %.1./"). ((,&*+*&.'&$%"),"-/0-"*+ 00)-&+(+$1.1./"). * *!* **+,-/& ("!",+.&/&+* .1./"). ((" /+)& 1"-",+.&/&+* /%&*4() !",+.&/&+*.1./"). +* +*/ //%&*4())".0-")"*/+# +,/& ( +/&*$. *)/+ 2) Integrate Agilent’s proven analog-to-digital technology into your design. Seamlessly design-in Agilent’s high-speed Explore the range of high-speed digitizers technology to fulfill your product requirements, while maintaining your in-house technical 500 MSa/s to 8 GSa/s on one or more channels know-how and intellectual property. Reuse and Resolution of 8, 10, 12 or 14 bits upgradability of both hardware and software Bandwidths of up to 3 GHz reduces your risk, protects your investment and gets your products to market faster. Flexible acquisition memory Be First — with Agilent Fast throughput with on-board real-time processing Select and compare the digitizer that best fits your need. Discover the Alternatives … ... AAgilent Modular Products www.agilent.com/find/embedded-digitizers © 2011 Agilent Technologies, Inc. CONTENTS 68 Editorial Our honorary Aussie Ernie A Publication of the Australian Institute of Physics 69 President’s Column Promoting the role of physics in research, education, industry and the community. Marc Duldig on a recent case of unethical EDITOR advertising Peter Robertson [email protected] 70 News & Comment ASSISTANT EDITOR Dr Akin Budi Not so FASTS: Science & [email protected] Technology Australia Big step towards the Square BOOK REVIEWS EDITOR Kilometre Array Dr John Macfarlane Cover [email protected] Decadal Plan for Australian A portrait of Ernest Rutherford by the astronomy SAMPLINGS EDITOR Belgium artist Jozef Janssens. A wartime refugee, Janssens settled in Cambridge Dr Don Price where he befriended the Rutherfords. [email protected] 72 One hundred years Although unsigned and undated, the EDITORIAL BOARD of nuclear physics portrait is thought to have been painted in A/Prof Brian James (Chair) John Campbell traces the 1916. Janssens also painted Rutherford’s [email protected] path taken by Ernest daughter Eileen in the same year. Dr M. A. Box Rutherford and his group at [Courtesy: John Campbell and the Dr J. Holdsworth Rutherford family.] the University of A/Prof R. J. Stening Manchester that led to the Prof H. A. Bachor discovery of the atomic nucleus Prof H. Rubinsztein-Dunlop Prof S. Tingay 78 Measuring Rutherford’s impact on science ASSOCIATE EDITOR – EDUCATION Dr Colin Taylor [email protected] David Lockwood and colleagues discover that Rutherford’s work has undergone ‘scientifc obliteration’, perhaps the ASSOCIATE EDITORS highest accolade that can be bestowed on a scientist Dr John Humble [email protected] Dr Laurence Campbell [email protected] Dr Frederick Osman [email protected] 84 Is Einstein still right? Dr Wen Xin Tang [email protected] Despite numerous empirical successes, General Relativity is continually being called into question – more so now than SUBMISSION GUIDELINES perhaps ever before – as Paul Lasky reports Articles for submission to Australian Physics should be sent in electronically. Word or rich text format are preferred. Images should not be embedded in the document, but should be sent as high resolution attachments in JPG 90 Book Reviews format. Authors should also send a short bio and a recent photo. The Editor Anna Binnie on ‘Mrs Perkins’s Electric Quilt and Other reserves the right to edit articles based on space requirements and editorial Intriguing Stories of Mathematical Physics’ by Paul J. Nahin content. Contributions should be sent to the Editor. Mukunda Das on ‘The Quantum Story: A History in 40 ADVERTISING Moments’ by Jim Baggott Enquiries should be sent to the Editor. Lee Weissel on ‘Order, Disorder and Criticality: Advanced Published six times a year. Problems of Phase Transition Theory’ by Yurij Holovatch (ed.) Copyright 2010 Pub. No. PP 224960 / 00008 92 Product News ISSN 1837-5375 A review of new products from Lastek, Toptica Photonics, The statements made and the opinions expressed in Australian Physics do Warsash Scientifc and Coherent Scientifc not necessarily refect the views of the Australian Institute of Physics or its Council or Committees. PRODUCTION Inside Back Cover Control Publications Pty Ltd Physics conferences for 2011 and 2012 Box 2155 Wattletree Rd PO, VIC 3145. [email protected] MAY–JUNE 2011 | 48(3) AUSTRALIAN PHYSICS 67 EDITORIAL Australian Institute of Physics Our honorary AIP website: www.aip.org.au Aussie Ernie AIP Executive President Dr Marc Duldig Welcome to this particularly in- [email protected] ternational issue of Australian Vice President Dr Robert Robinson [email protected] Physics. Te authors of our three Secretary Dr Andrew Greentree [email protected] Treasurer Dr Judith Pollard feature articles are all from over- [email protected] seas – three from Germany, one Registrar A/Prof Bob Loss from Canada and one from New [email protected] Zealand (admittedly one is an Immediate Past President A/Prof Brian James Australian postdoc). [email protected] Special Projects Ofcers If we were to conduct a poll Dr John Humble to vote for the top ten physicists of the twentieth century, there is [email protected] little doubt as to who would fnish in top spot. But where would Dr Olivia Samardzic Ernest Rutherford rank in your top ten, if at all? I would certainly [email protected] put him in my top fve and probably in my top three. It’s hard to AIP ACT Branch think of a better or more infuential experimental physicist over Chair Dr Anna Wilson the past hundred years. [email protected] Rutherford was awarded the 1908 Nobel Prize for Chemistry Secretary Joe Hope (shared with Marie Curie and Henri Becquerel) but, as noted in a [email protected] previous editorial, did not win a Nobel Prize for Physics. And yet, AIP NSW Branch as noted in the two articles by John Campbell and by Werner Chair Dr Graeme Melville [email protected] Marx, Manuel Cardona and David Lockwood, if circumstances Secretary Dr Frederick Osman had been a little diferent Rutherford might have been the frst [email protected] scientist to have won three. Arguably Rutherford’s greatest achievement was the discovery AIP QLD Branch Chair Dr Joel Corney of the atomic nucleus in 1911 while at the University of Manchester, [email protected] one that founded a whole new branch of physics. But there was Secretary Dr Till Weinhold [email protected] no Nobel gong. (Manchester had its Nobel breakthrough with Patrick Blackett in 1948 and again in 2010.) AIP SA Branch Similarly in 1919, then at Cambridge, Rutherford bombarded Chair Dr Scott Foster [email protected] nitrogen nuclei with alpha particles and observed the emission of Secretary Dr Laurence Campbell [email protected] protons, indicating that oxygen nuclei had been formed. Tis was the frst controlled transmutation of atomic nuclei, fulflling the AIP TAS Branch old alchemists’ dream of changing one element into another. For Chair Dr Elizabeth Chelkowska good measure, the following year he predicted the existence and [email protected] Secretary Dr Stephen Newbury [email protected] properties of neutrons, confrmed in 1932 by his long-term col- laborator James Chadwick. Would that get a gong today? AIP VIC Branch From the sub-atomic world, our third feature article goes to Chair Dr Andrew Stevenson [email protected] cosmological scales. Just as physicists are looking for new physics Secretary Dr Mark Boland [email protected] beyond the Standard Model of the structure of matter, Paul Lasky AIP WA Branch explains that there are clues emerging that the structure and Chair A/Prof Marjan Zadnik [email protected] evolution of the universe may be governed by new physics beyond Secretary Dr Andrea Biondo [email protected] General Relativity. Finally, it’s a pleasure to introduce our Samplings Editor, Don Printing Price from CSIRO Lindfeld. Pinnacle Print Group 288 Dundas Street, Thornbury VIC 3071 Peter Robertson www.pinnacleprintgroup.com.au 68 AUSTRALIAN PHYSICS 48(3) | MAY–JUNE 2011 PRESIDENT’S COLUMN Unethical advertising Tis month our Editor allocated relevant and should be supported, is me a shorter column (for reasons going too far. of space), so I am going to have a I am appalled that Neuroscience little gripe. Not about physics or Australia felt that this was a reasonable physicists but about advertising. approach. Worse the Astronomical Many of you will have seen the ad- Society of Australia wrote to them vertisements run by Neuroscience stating that it was not in the best in- Australia that are asking for dona- terest of any science to make such tions for brain research. I am sure statements and received a reply saying that everyone agrees that this research that no one appeared to be com- is both necessary and worthy of plaining and they would continue public support and that it is most to run the advertisements. I know reasonable for Neuroscience Australia that a number of other individuals to have sought an advertising agency and organisations raised objections to help them make the public call to the advertisement. but we need funds to further under- for funds and to use the television Several people noted that those stand the brain and to repair it when stations’ ‘community service’ slots very brain scans that were being used it goes wrong. to get the message out at minimal to encourage donations would not Not that I expect anything to cost.
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