Hot Physics in the Cold War

Home , Igor Tamm, Lev Landau, Vitaly Ginzburg

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Buried Glory: scattering from phonons was probably was rather monogamous, whereas Lev was Portraits of Soviet discovered by Raman in 1928 or Brillouin a serial philanderer. Scientists in 1922, but as quantization only began It is interesting that the author mentions to be understood after de Broglie in 1924, Landau’s condescending misunderstanding By Istvan Hargittai it is moot to attribute phonons to Tamm of Dirac’s antiparticles (although Dirac in 1929, especially as his noted paper himself initially mistook his anti-electrons OXFORD UNIV. PRESS: on phonons appeared in 1932. Russians for protons), and perhaps more interesting 2013. 352PP. US$35.00 have always aggressively maintained that that he remarks on Landau’s publication this was all predicted by Mandelshtam of his own students’ work. This was not in 1918, but he only published his ideas uncommon among Soviet-era physicists, in 1926, and credit in science generally with Ginzburg publishing the so-called goes with publication date, not clever Ginzburg criterion for fluctuation ideas. Perhaps worst of all in the context phenomena as sole author in 1960, despite stvan Hargittai’s book, Buried Glory, of “buried glory” is the discussion of the it being published in detail a year earlier by is a hagiography (‘lives of saints’) of Cherenkov effect — many Soviet physicists his student Arkadiy Levanyuk. Such lapses Ifourteen Soviet scientists of the Cold of that era have spoken of Cherenkov in scientific ethics would not have gone War era, making most of them sound as “the dumbest person to win a Nobel unnoticed or unpunished in the West. more like Mother Teresa than like Prize in physics”, pointing out that the There are a few eccentricities in the Albert Einstein or Richard Feynman. observation was a complete accident, that book. The suggestion that V. S. Letokhov As the title indicates, the author feels he did not understand the effect, and that should have shared Chu’s Nobel Prize that their great contributions (mostly to “he did not understand the effect even after is just silly. Letokhov’s work (mostly on physics) have gone unrecognized. This Tamm explained it to him”. So much for laser separation of isotopes) was not is a remarkable inference, given that half buried glory. of the same rank in science, and this of them (Igor Tamm, Nikolai Semenov, There is a great deal of discussion example shows the author’s prejudices. Lev Landau, Petr Kapitza, Alexei Abrikosov, about those who were elected to the Similarly, leaving Gorkov out of the Nobel Vitaly Ginzburg and Andrei Sakharov) Russian Academy of Sciences as full or Prize shared by Abrikosov has not been were awarded Nobel Prizes. corresponding members. The author seems widely viewed as controversial. Other The book is highly readable and offers surprised that these elections are often questionable comments include the reason some insights (undocumented) into based in part on politics or criteria other for Abrikosov’s second divorce — it was not their personal lives, but it unfortunately than academic accomplishments. Yet this that his wife “became homesick for France.” strays into old areas of polarized opinions seems equally true in the USA in 2013 as The two parted ways with great animosity and controversial history: for example, in the USSR in the 1950s. In both the US that was totally unrelated to homesickness. the developments of hydrogen bomb National Academy of Sciences and the UK Abrikosov stayed with my wife and me in technology credited to Sakharov (or even Royal Society members are explicitly asked Boulder, Colorado, for a few days in 1991 worse, to Edward Teller, about whom to consider gender and geographic location when he emigrated to the USA and gave a Hargittai previously wrote a controversial as priorities, as opposed to scientific merit. very different account. The author is very biography) were largely due to Stan Ulam, As to who got buried in Novodevichy critical of Abrikosov and suggests that “he as indeed his still-classified, single-authored Cemetery — well, it was my pleasure and his wife might find themselves quite work shows. This is now known by much to tour it (a rare privilege in 1981), and lonely” in their twilight years in the USA. of the scientific community — based on Hargittai finds it extremely valuable as I assure him that many of us in the West numerous published histories — as is the a sign of national respect. But I cannot valued our friendship with Abrikosov, and fact that no hydrogen bomb designed by imagine that being buried in a prominent he has indeed made friends outside Russia. Teller ever worked. Thus referring to the Orthodox Christian cemetery would have All societies like having saints. One “Teller–Ulam model” or to Teller as the been important to Ginzburg, for example. should not confuse great physics with a proverbial “father of the hydrogen bomb” The chapters on Kapitza, Landau and pious life. Feynman and Oppenheimer had is mythology, not history. Ulam is never Evgeny Lifshits are insightful and balanced. complex personal lives and were not saints; mentioned in this book, which is odd as he Kapitza was larger than life. His disdain don’t confuse that with evaluations of their and the author (like Teller) are Hungarian. for Sergey Vavilov could be clarified great work. Writing a book about Russian He clearly invented many of Sakharov’s somewhat; it is downplayed — in actuality physics and physicists should not be an “discoveries”. And crediting Sakharov with he refused to use the Institute stationery excuse for lionizing the ones you liked re-discoveries that may have been based as Vavilov’s name was on the letterhead. personally or feigning worry about the on espionage is hardly appropriate without And Lifshits was certainly more of a retirement years of those you didn’t. ❐ further documentation. genuine collaborator with Landau than Similar ill-advised excursions by the scribe. Landau’s marriage to Kora was not REVIEWED BY JAMES F. SCOTT author include repeated credit to Tamm exactly as the author describes: he writes James F. Scott is at the Cavendish Laboratory, for discovering phonons in 1929. Phonons that “When they married, they gave each University of Cambridge, J. J. Thomson Road, are quantized vibrational waves, and their other full freedom.” That is misleading; as Cambridge CB3 0HE, UK. “discovery” is partly semantics: quantized described in Kora’s recent biography, she e-mail: [email protected]

NATURE PHYSICS | VOL 9 | NOVEMBER 2013 | www.nature.com/naturephysics 691