This Week in Physics History: Nov. 17 - 23
Monday November 17, 2008
- Nov. 23, 1837 - Dutch scientist and physicist Johannes Diderik van der Waals is born. The van der Waals' forces are named after him, and he is known for extensive work in thermodynamics, which resulted in his 1910 Nobel Prize in physics.
- Nov. 18, 1897 - English experimental physicist Patrick Blackett (Baron Blackett) is born. Blackett did work with cloud chambers and designed a variant called the counter-controlled cloud chamber, which could be used to explore cosmic rays. It was for this work that he received the 1948 Nobel Prize in Physics.
- Nov. 17, 1902 - Hungarian physicist Eugene Paul Wigner is born. He went on to become a key contributor to quantum theory, specifically with regards to atomic nuclei and the development of symmetry theory, though he never gained the same popularity as Einstein, Bohr, and others. Because of his intellectual ability, which many placed on par with Einstein, he gained the nickname "the Silent Genius." He was awarded the 1963 Nobel Prize in Physics.
- Nov. 22, 1904 - French physicist Louis Eugene Felix Neel is born. Neel receive the 1970 Nobel Prize in Physics for pioneering work in the magnetic properties of solids. Among this work, he provided the explanation of weak magnetic fields in certain rocks, making possible the study of geomagnetism.
- Nov. 21, 1905 - Albert Einstein's paper, "Does the Inertia of a Body Depend Upon Its Energy Content?", is published in the science journal Annalen der Physik. In this paper, he uses his work from earlier in the year on special relativity to expand into a theory of mass-energy equivalent, denoted by the famous equation E = mc2. This is the fourth of Einstein's Annus Mirabilis Papers, or "Wonderful Year Papers," because he published four revolutionary papers in 1905, while an obscure patent clerk. The story of this discovery is related in the PBS NOVA documentary Einstein's Big Idea.
- Nov. 18, 1962 - Danish physicist Niels Bohr, who was probably the most important figure in understanding and explaining quantum physics in its early years, dies.
- Nov. 21, 1970 - Indian physicist Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman dies. Raman received the 1930 Nobel Prize in Physics for work in molecular scattering of light, specifically the discovery of the Raman effect which bears his name.
- Nov. 17, 1990 - American physicist Robert Hofstadter dies. Hofstadter received the 1961 Nobel Prize in physics for his work in electron scattering, which helped determine the structures of atomic nuclei. He taught at Stanford University from 1950 to 1985. His book Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid received the 1980 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction.
- Nov. 21, 1996 - Pakistani theoretical physicist Abdul Salam dies. Salam was the first Muslim, and also the first Pakistani, to receive a Nobel Prize in science. The 1979 Nobel Prize in physics went to him for work in unifying two fundamental forces of physics, the electromagnetic and weak nuclear interactions.
Comments
No comments yet. Leave a Comment