Obituary Wolfgang Paul

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Obituary Wolfgang Paul Physics Today Wolfgang Paul Peter E. Toschek Citation: Physics Today 47(7), 76 (1994); doi: 10.1063/1.2808585 View online: http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.2808585 View Table of Contents: http://scitation.aip.org/content/aip/magazine/physicstoday/47/7?ver=pdfcov Published by the AIP Publishing Reuse of AIP Publishing content is subject to the terms at: https://publishing.aip.org/authors/rights-and-permissions. Download to IP: 134.100.111.188 On: Wed, 14 Sep 2016 07:25:01 presented to Robert P. Carlyon, a Frank von Hippel, assistant direc- professor in the Laboratory of Experi- tor of science and security in the US mental Psychology at the University Office of Science and Technology Pol- of Sussex in England. Carlyon was icy, for "employing his technical cited for "contributions to knowledge knowledge to advance the under- concerning the auditory processing of standing of controversial security is- spectrally and temporally complex sues." sound." Nathaniel I. Durlach was the re- The Academy of Sciences at Gottingen cipient of the Silver Medal in Psycho- in Germany conferred its 1993 Dannie logical and Physiological Acoustics. Heineman Award on Richard N. Durlach, a professor with the sensory Zare of Stanford University. The communication group in the electrical academy cited Zare for "outstanding engineering department at MIT, was work in the field of spectroscopy and cited for "pioneering contributions to reaction dynamics." research concerning binaural hearing, intensity perception, hearing aids, tactile aids and virtual reality." OBITUARIES Wolfgang Paul Leo L. Beranek IN BRIEF On 7 December 1993 Wolfgang Paul, contributions to acoustics. The American Philosophical Society one of the most outstanding and re- Leo L. Beranek was given hon- has presented its Benjamin Franklin spected figures of European atomic orary fellowship in ASA, a distinc- Medal to Chen Ning Yang, Albert and particle physics in the postwar tion conferred on only 11 other in- Einstein Professor and director of the era, passed away. He died from kid- dividuals since ASA was formed in Institute for Theoretical Physics at ney failure and cardiac disorder four 1929; the first to be so honored was the State University of New York, months after his 80th birthday, at his Thomas Alva Edison. Beranek was Stony Brook. The society recognized home in Bonn, the center of his ac- cited for "major, sustained and di- Yang for "profound and original con- tivities for 41 years. verse contributions to acoustics tributions to physics—especially the Born on 10 August 1913 in Lorenz- through both research and practical discovery of the nonconservation of kirch, Saxony, Paul grew up in Mu- applications, to education in acous- parity and of non-Abelian gauge nich. After two years with the Tech- tics and to the several professional fields, which laid the foundation for nische Hochschule Munich, he went societies representing this multidis- new intellectual structures—and a in 1934 to the Technische Hochschule ciplinary field." Beranek, who is re- love of mathematical beauty, which Berlin, where he joined Hans Kopfer- tired, was a cofounder of Bolt Ber- helped him reveal the mysterious mann's research group and earned the anek and Newman. working of nature." diploma (1937) and doctorate (1939) degrees. In 1937 he moved with that ASA awarded its Gold Medal to Carl Sagan, director of the Labora- team and set out to participate in David M. Green for his "contribu- tory for Planetary Studies at Cornell pioneering studies at the universities tions to knowledge, theory and meth- University, has received the Public of Kiel and later Gottingen on the odology in audition." Green, an ex- Welfare Medal, the highest honor be- hyperfine structure of atomic spectra pert in the psychology of hearing, is stowed by the National Academy of and—with Wilhelm Walcher—on a graduate research professor in psy- Sciences. He was cited for "his ability mass spectrometry. In 1944 he be- chology at the University of Florida, to capture the imagination of millions came a faculty member at Gottingen, Gainesville. and to explain difficult concepts in where he worked with the legendary The R. Brace Lindsay Award was understandable terms." 6-MeV betatron, the first of its kind on the European continent. In 1952 The American Association for the Ad- he moved to Bonn to take over re- vancement of Science has announced sponsibility for the physics institute the recipients of a number of awards. of the university there, whose former Harvey Brooks of the Harvard Uni- directors had included Heinrich Hertz versity John F. Kennedy School of and Heinrich Kayser but which was Government was given the 1993 in bad shape in the aftermath of the AAAS Philip Hauge Abelson Prize for war. Paul and his growing number "contributions to the public's under- of associates enthusiastically devel- standing of science as a cultural in- oped research programs on a broad stitution." Thomas Malone, director scope of subjects, ranging from optical of the Sigma Xi Center at Research and mass spectroscopy to atomic Triangle Park, North Carolina, was beams to electron and ion physics. honored with the 1993 AAAS Award The best known results of this re- for International Scientific Coopera- search are the electric mass filter, tion. The citation noted that Malone widely used as a residual gas ana- had promoted "international efforts to lyzer, and the electrodynamic ion preserve and protect the global envi- trap, which turned out many years ronment for more than five decades." later to be one of the essential ingre- The 1994 AAAS Hilliard Roderick dients for the isolation and detection Prize in Science, Arms Control and of single atomic ions. In 1989 Paul David M. Green International Security went to shared the Nobel Physics Prize with Reuse of 7AIP6 PublishingPHYSIC contentS TODA Yis subjectJULY to 199 the4 terms at: https://publishing.aip.org/authors/rights-and-permissions. Download to IP: 134.100.111.188 On: Wed, 14 Sep 2016 07:25:01 WE HEAR THAT the achievers. It was more than a Don's review article, written in 1957 quip when the great Wolfgang Pauli, with Maurice M. Levy and David Ra- commenting on the similarity of their venhall, was a standard reference in names, once referred to Paul as "my this field for years. At the same time, real part in Bonn." he pioneered the theoretical analysis After his retirement in 1981, Paul of inelastic electron collisions. His became president of the Alexander paper with Richard H. Dalitz laid the von Humboldt Foundation. For more groundwork for this subject, in which than a decade he lobbied for this in- hundreds of papers have since been stitution, which grants fellowships in generated. Germany for top scientists—junior One of Don's most influential pa- and established—from all over the pers was written in 1961 with Steven world. Many of them will join Paul's C. Frautschi and Hiroshi Suura. It students, associates and colleagues in provided the definitive resolution of the memory of a most remarkable the infrared-divergence problem in physicist and warmhearted personal- quantum electrodynamics. This work ity. His many friends in the physics completed the earlier effort by Felix community will miss his advice, his Bloch and Arnold Nordsieck, put the quick wit and his indefatigable em- analysis on a solid quantum field phasis on the essentials—in physics theoretic basis and provided the tech- Wolfgang Paul and beyond. nical tools needed to extract meaning- PETER E. TOSCHEK ful answers from quantum electrody- Norman Ramsey and Hans Dehmelt University of Hamburg namics to any order in perturbation for his work on the ion trap. Hamburg, Germany theory. From the mid-1950s on, Paul's Don's incomparable technical interests focused on electron accel- skills, together with his profound un- erators. He started with a 500-MeV derstanding of quantum field theory, synchrotron, designed and imple- Donald R. Yennie are well illustrated by his high-preci- mented by his team as a kind of Donald R. Yennie, a professor of phys- sion work on simple atoms in quan- laboratory extravaganza. Later he ics at Cornell University, died on tum electrodynamics. His analyses, managed to add a 2.5-GeV synchro- 14 April 1993 at the age of 69. He particularly of the Lamb shift and tron, which has now been used for was an internationally recognized hyperfine splittings in hydrogen and almost three decades as a source of authority on quantum electrodynam- muonium, remain among the most electrons for experiments on the ics, the fundamental theory of electro- challenging ever attempted in quan- photoproduction of mesons, elastic magnetic interactions. He will be re- tum field theory. They provided a electron-proton scattering and syn- membered not only as a leader in the starting point for a generation of re- chrotron radiation. Paul played a most difficult and precise aspects of searchers in this field. Don was ac- leading role in the early evolution this field, but also as a beloved tively involved in such work at the of CERN, where he served as direc- teacher and friend to his many stu- time of his death. tor of the nuclear physics division dents and colleagues. Don was always deeply interested from 1965 through 1967. For sev- Don was born in Paterson, New in experimental results as well as the eral more years he acted as chair- Jersey, on 4 March 1924. He was an theory behind the experiments. This man of various committees, both undergraduate at the Stevens Insti- interest was evident in his extensive at CERN and in Germany. He tute of Technology, where he obtained work on the interactions of high-en- was among the founding fathers an MA in physics in 1945 and was a ergy photons with hadrons, which led of the nuclear science center in physics instructor from 1946 to 1947.
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