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Ernest Rutherford: Scientist Supreme - Iopscience 7/2/2018 Ernest Rutherford: scientist supreme - IOPscience This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this site you agree to our use of cookies. To find out more, see our Privacy and Cookies policy. FEATURE Ernest Rutherford: scientist supreme John Campbell1 Physics World, Volume 11, Number 9 1 Physics Department, Univeristy of Canterbury, Private Bag 4800, Christchurch, New Zealand John Campbell 1998 Phys. World 11 (9) 35 https://doi.org/10.1088/2058-7058/11/9/27 Abstract Ernest Rutherford is one of the most illustrious scientists that the world has ever seen. He achieved enduring international fame because of an incredibly productive life, during which he altered our view of nature on three separate occasions. Combining brilliantly conceived experiments with much hard work and special insight, he explained the perplexing problem of naturally occurring radioactivity, determined the structure of the atom, and was the world's first successful alchemist, changing nitrogen into oxygen. Export citation and abstract BibTeX RIS Access this article Login options http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2058-7058/11/9/27/pdf 1/2 Physics World FEATURE Related content - OUR VIEW OF NATURE AS Ernest Rutherford: scientist supreme BROADENED BY SCIENCE John C. Merriam To cite this article: John Campbell 1998 Phys. World 11 (9) 35 - Does physics have a place in schools? Mike Pentney - Environmental monitoring through use of silica-based TLD Z Siti Rozaila, M U Khandaker, S F Abdul View the article online for updates and enhancements. Sani et al. This content was downloaded from IP address 108.171.128.173 on 09/07/2018 at 16:28 One hundred years ago this month, Ernest Rutherford - a talented young New Zea lander who had just spent three years as a postgraduate student in Britain - left for Canada, where he was to do the work that won hima Nobel prize. All three countries can justifiably claim this great scientist as their own Ernest Rutherford: scientist supreme John Campbell ERNEST Rutherford is one of the 1937 - by then very much an elder most illustrious scientists that the statesman of science - the New York world has ever seen. He achieved Times was moved to write the follow- enduring international fame because || ing: "It is given to but few men to of an incredibly productive life, dur- achieve immortality, still less to achieve ing which he altered our view of Olympian rank, during their own life- nature on three separate occasions. time. Lord Rutherford achieved both. Combining brilliantly conceived ex- In a generation that witnessed one of periments with much hard work the greatest revolutions in the entire and special insight, he explained the history of science, he was universally perplexing problem of naturally oc- acknowledged as the leading explorer curring radioactivity, determined the of the vast, infinitely complex universe structure of the atom, and was the within the atom, a universe mat he world's first successful alchemist, was first to penetrate." changing nitrogen into oxygen. Rutherford received a Nobel prize New Zealand - a lucky start for the first discovery, but the other Earnest (sic) Rutherford was born two would have been equally worthy lucky. Although he made his own luck candidates, had they been discovered once he began his scientific research, by someone else. Indeed, any one of Rutherford as a student in New Zealand in about 1892. many things fell fortuitously into place his other secondary achievements - Tall and lean, he was a useful rugby player and led an for him before that. He was lucky that many of which are now almost for- active student life. He soon obtained the standard BA he was born neither a girl nor the degree from Canterbury College as well as masters gotten - would have been enough to degrees in both mathematics and physical sciences. eldest son. He was lucky to have been bring fame to a lesser scientist. For Awarded a research scholarship in 1895, he left to seek brought up surrounded by hardwork- example, he invented an electrical his fortune in Europe. ing, practical people. He was lucky to method for detecting individual ion- have obtained three separate scholar- izing radiations, he dated the age of the Earth, and briefly ships, each on the second attempt. But most of all, he was held the world record for the distance over which wireless lucky to have been born to James and Marma Rutherford. waves could be detected. He predicted the existence of neut- They were a couple who valued education: Martha because rons, he oversaw the development of large-scale particle she had been educated and James because he had not. accelerators, and, during the First World War, he led the His father's family had emigrated from Scotland to New allied research into the detection of submarines. Zealand in 1842, while his mother's had come from England A New Zealander born and bred, Rutherford left his home- in 1855. Botii arrived as children, aged three and twelve, land in 1895 at the age of 23 for Cambridge, where he was to respectively, and the story of how tiiey met is an interesting- become one of the university's first research students. After one (see Rutherford's Ancestors in further reading). His parents three years there he moved again, this time to McGill Uni- married in 1866, and on 30 August 1871 their fourth child (of versity in Canada, which was the scene of some of his most 12) and second son was born in rural Nelson on New Zea- famous early work. He came back to Britain in 1908, first land's South Island. Two months later, the child was mista- spending 11 years at Manchester, before finally returning to kenly registered as "Earnest". Cambridge shortly after the First World War. When he died in The family moved regularly, as James' work dictated. They PHYSICS WORLD SEPTEMBER 1998 35 1 Rutherford's first great discovery - atoms are not and light - although he avoided chemistry, as he knew that [ always stable the teacher was only one step ahead of the class. Out of school, he rose to sergeant in the cadet corps and learnt self- defence in affrays in the college hostel. NOBELPRJS19' In 1890 Ern moved to Canterbury College in Christchurch. The amazing thing about New Zealand at the time was that MF,£NIKOV ,- within 50 years of the crudest European settlement, the EHRL1CH country already boasted a flourishing university system. The RiITHf.RFORD progress was largely due to the Canterbury Association - a group of people in Britain who began colonizing New Zealand in 1850. The association wanted to found a Can- terbury university that would attract students from as far away as India and Australia. When Canterbury College was SVERIGE 35 formally established in 1873 in the town of Christchurch - itself named after the Oxford college - the population of the whole province was a mere 55 000. Sweden issued this SKr 35 stamp in 1968 to commemorate Rutherford's 1908 Nobel prize for his work on radioactivity At Canterbury, Ern entered the full life of an undergra- duate. Tall and lean, he played rugby as a useful forward. On After two years of research in New Zealand, Ernest Rutherford alternative Saturday nights he debated at the Dialectic obtained a scholarship that he eventually chose to take up in Society, on one occasion supporting the motion "that the Cambridge. Such was his skill in experimental work, that within influence of the modern newspaper press is excessive and months of his arrival in 1895 at the age of 24, he was invited to assist dangerous". He also attended the science society, which he the head of the Cavendish Laboratory, J J Thomson, who was trying to once addressed on electrical waves and oscillations. Ern understand how gases could be made to conduct electricity. When lodged in the house of Mary Newton, who had been a Thomson announced the discovery of the electron in 1897, staunch member of the Women's Christian Temperance Rutherford was an immediate convert to the idea of objects smaller Union ever since her husband had drunk himself to death. than atoms. He began to use the newly discovered X-rays and the The group knew that if women were to have some control rays from radioactive materials to help with Thomson's work on over liquor they needed to be enfranchised, and in 1893 - the conduction in gases. first year in which Ern was old enough to appear on the elec- When he moved to McGill University in Canada in 1898, toral roll - New Zealand became the first country in the world Rutherford tried to understand radioactivity. He and his assistants to allow women the vote. But he gained something else from found that thorium gave off an "emanation" that was radioactive; the Newton household: he later married the young daughter, essentially, Rutherford had discovered radon gas. In 1901 he invited Mary (May) Newton. a young chemist, Frederick Soddy, who was initially committed to the On passing the standard BA degree, Rutherford obtained chemists' view that atoms were stable, to do some of the chemical the one scholarship in New Zealand for a masters degree in work. Within three months, they were confidently talkingabout atoms mathematics. Such was his ability that he ended up taking a transmuting into other elements. For this work on radioactivity, double masters degree, also obtaining first-class honours in Rutherford was awarded the 1908 Nobel Prize for Chemistry. physical science. Although both subjects included exams, the latter course also required candidates to carry out an original investigation. What was he to do? He turned down one sug- went to nearby Foxhill for railway construction and farming, gestion to look for the molecular building blocks of life by fol- to Havelock for flax- and saw-milling, and finally to Taranaki lowing electrical discharges in gases, as he felt he did not know on the North Island for flax-milling.
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