Temptations of theory, strategies of evidence: P. M. S. Blackett and the earth's magnetism, 1947–52

1999 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 69-92 ◽  
Author(s):  
MARY JO NYE
Keyword(s):  
Particle Physics ◽  
Nuclear Physics ◽  
Royal Society ◽  
Cosmic Ray ◽  
Alpha Particles ◽  
Electrons And Positrons ◽  
Experimental Physicist ◽  
The University ◽  
University Of Manchester ◽  
Experimental Researches

In the late spring of 1947, the experimental physicist P. M. S. Blackett succumbed to the temptations of theory. At this time, Blackett (1897–1974) was fifty years old. He was a veteran of the Cavendish tradition in particle physics and he was on his way to an unshared award of the 1948 Nobel Prize for his experimental researches in nuclear physics and cosmic-ray physics. His photographs of cloud-chamber tracks of alpha particles, protons, electrons and positrons were well known to practitioners of particle physics, even as they now grace the pages of physics textbooks.Blackett's turn toward theory in 1947 involved some risk for a well-established experimental physicist. The 3 May 1947 issue of Nature carried an announcement of his forthcoming lecture at the Royal Society:Professor P. M. S. Blackett, Langworthy Professor of Physics in the University of Manchester, will deliver a lecture on ‘The Magnetic Field of Massive Rotating Bodies’ at a meeting of the Royal Society on May 15, at 4:30 p.m.Blackett circulated a preliminary draft of his paper among colleagues in several different fields, including the geophysicist Sydney Chapman and the astrophysicist Harry Plaskett.

The Crocodile and the Elephant

1997 ◽  
Vol 51 (2) ◽  
pp. 309-316
Author(s):  
A. R. Mackintosh
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Physics ◽  
Quantum Physics ◽  
Great Majority ◽  
Gold Medal ◽  
Niels Bohr ◽  
Memorial Lecture ◽  
Mcgill University ◽  
Peter Kapitza ◽  
The University ◽  
University Of Manchester

In 1907 Ernest Rutherford (later named ‘The Crocodile’ by Peter Kapitza), 36 years old and already a world–famous physicist, moved from McGill University in Montreal, Canada, to the University of Manchester, England. In the same year Niels Bohr (later known by some as ‘The Elephant’––he was one of the very few non–royal recipients of the Order of the Elephant), a 22–year–old student at the University of Copenhagen, received the gold medal of the Royal Danish Academy for his first research project, an experimental and theoretical study of water jets. During the next 30 years, until Rutherford's death in 1937, these two great scientists dominated quantum physics. Rutherford was the father of nuclear physics; together they founded atomic physics; and, with their students and colleagues, they were responsible for the great majority of the decisive advances made in the inter–war years. This lecture tells the story of the development in quantum physics, and makes some comparisons between Bohr and Rutherford–as men and scientists–drawing especially on their extensive correspondence between 1912 and 1937, the material that Bohr gathered in connection with the publication in 1961 of his Rutherford Memorial Lecture, the interviews that he gave just before his death in 1962, and other published and unpublished material from the Niels Bohr Archive in Copenhagen.

scholarly journals James Watson Cronin. 29 September 1931 — 25 August 2016

2018 ◽  
Vol 65 ◽  
pp. 47-70
Author(s):  
Alan Watson
Keyword(s):  
Cosmic Rays ◽  
Cp Violation ◽  
Nobel Prize ◽  
Particle Physics ◽  
Cosmic Ray ◽  
Pierre Auger Observatory ◽  
Data Analyst ◽  
Experimental Physicist ◽  
The Creation

James (Jim) Cronin had two outstanding careers. The first, in particle physics, included the discovery of CP violation for which he and Val Fitch were awarded the Nobel Prize in 1980. During the second, in cosmic rays, he played a major role in raising the profile of that field, particularly through his leadership in the creation of the Pierre Auger Observatory, the largest cosmic-ray detector ever constructed. He will be remembered for his incisive mind, his modest style, his internationalism and his encouragement of young scientists, as well as for his brilliance as an experimental physicist and data analyst.

scholarly journals John Edward Lennard-Jones, 1894-1954

1955 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 174-184 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Royal Society ◽  
Trinity College ◽  
National Physical Laboratory ◽  
Grammar School ◽  
Atoms And Molecules ◽  
Lennard Jones ◽  
Physical Laboratory ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The University ◽  
University Of Manchester

John Lennard-Jones was born on 27 October 1894 in Leigh, Lancashire and was educated at Leigh Grammar School, where he specialized in classics. In 1912 he entered Manchester University, changed his subject to mathematics in which he took an honours degree and then an M.Sc. under Professor Lamb, carrying out some research on the theory of sound. In 1915 he joined the Royal Flying Corps, obtained his Wings in 1917 and saw service in France; he also took part in some investigations on aerodynamics with Messrs Boulton and Paul and at the National Physical Laboratory. In 1919 he returned to the University of Manchester as lecturer in mathematics, took the degree of D.Sc. of that university and continued to work on vibrations in gases, becoming more and more interested in the gas-kinetic aspects of the subject as his paper of 1922 in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society shows. In 1922, on the advice of Professor Sydney Chapman, he applied for and was elected to a Senior 1851 Exhibition to enable him to work in Cambridge, where he became a research student at Trinity College and was awarded the degree of Ph.D. in 1924. At Cambridge under the influence of R. H. Fowler he became more and more interested in the forces between atoms and molecules and in the possibility of deducing them from the behaviour of gases.

scholarly journals CORSIKA 8

2021 ◽  
Vol 251 ◽  
pp. 03038
Author(s):  
Antonio Augusto Alves ◽  
Maximilian Reininghaus ◽  
André Schmidt ◽  
Remy Prechelt ◽  
Ralf Ulrich ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Particle Physics ◽  
Nuclear Physics ◽  
Hardware Acceleration ◽  
Cosmic Ray ◽  
High Energy ◽  
Ultra High Energy ◽  
Air Shower ◽  
Art Collection ◽  
The Status ◽  
Working Together

The CORSIKA 8 project is an international collaboration of scientists working together to deliver the most modern, flexible, robust and efficient framework for the simulation of ultra-high energy secondary particle cascades in matter. The main application is for cosmic ray air shower simulations, but it can also be applied to other problems in astro(particle)-physics, particle physics and nuclear physics. Besides a comprehensive and state-of-the-art collection of physics models as well as algorithms relevant for the field, also all possible interfaces to hardware acceleration (e.g. GPU) and parallelization (vectorization, multi-threading, multi-core) will be provided. We present the status and roadmap of this project. This code will soon be available for novel explorative studies and phenomonological research, and at the same time for massive productions runs for experiments.

scholarly journals Philip Burton Moon, 17 May 1907 - 9 October 1994

1996 ◽  
Vol 42 ◽  
pp. 249-264 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Physics ◽  
High Speed ◽  
Nuclear Reactions ◽  
Resonant Scattering ◽  
Selective Absorption ◽  
Wide Field ◽  
Experimental Physicist ◽  
The Government ◽  
Maud Committee ◽  
The University

Philip Moon was an experimental physicist whose achievements covered a wide field not only in atomic and nuclear physics but also in chemistry. He had a special talent for devising and using simple instrumentation to answer fundamental questions. Soon after the discovery of the neutron he proved that these particles could reach thermal energies in their passage through matter. He discovered the selective absorption of slow neutrons by nuclei and thereby helped to clarify the role of the particle in nuclear reactions. He was a member of the wartime MAUD Committee which advised the government on civil and military uses of atomic energy. He will be remembered for his development of high-speed rotors and for the application of this technique to the kinetics of chemical reactions, to the nuclear resonant scattering of γ radiation and to problems in relativity. Much of his academic life was spent at the University of Birmingham where he was a much loved and inspiring leader and teacher.

scholarly journals A somewhat random walk through nuclear and particle physics

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Cohen ◽  
Nicholas Poniatowski
Keyword(s):  
Particle Physics ◽  
Nuclear Physics ◽  
Higgs Mechanism ◽  
University Of Maryland ◽  
Maryland College ◽  
College Park ◽  
The University ◽  
Basic Philosophy ◽  
Do So

These notes are an outgrowth of an advanced undergraduate course taught at the University of Maryland, College Park. They are intended as an introduction to various aspects of particle and nuclear physics with an emphasis on the role of symmetry. The basic philosophy is to introduce many of the fundamental ideas in nuclear and particle physics using relatively sophisticated mathematical tools -- but to do so in as a simplified a context to explain the underlying ideas. Thus, for example, the Higgs mechanism is discussed in terms of an Abelian Higgs model. The emphasis is largely, but not entirely theoretical in orientation. The goal is for readers to develop an understanding of many of the underlying issues in a relatively sophisticated way.

Reminiscences and discoveries: James Chadwick at Liverpool

1994 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 299-308 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Particle Physics ◽  
Nuclear Physics ◽  
Atomic Bomb ◽  
High Energy ◽  
Business Community ◽  
High Energy Particle ◽  
Energy Particle ◽  
One Year ◽  
The University ◽  
New Facilities

There have been recent articles in Notes and Records concerning James Chadwick’s contributions to the development of the atomic bomb, and it seemed worthwhile to supplement these with some remarks on Chadwick’s establishment of an important centre of nuclear physics research in Liverpool, especially since I believe this was the achievement which gave him more satisfaction than any other. The following is the abridged text of a lecture given at the Centenary Celebrations at the University of Liverpool in October 1991. Chadwick came to Liverpool in 1935, the year in which he was awarded the Nobel Prize, and held the Lyon Jones Chair of Physics for 13 years. During that time he transformed the department from one which was quite ill-equipped for research, into one which would be able to stand comparison with any in the world in the fields of nuclear physics and high-energy particle physics. The University had been able to attract him by promising to support him with the provision of new staff posts and with help in building up new facilities for research. In addition he already had friends within the university and the business community through his wife, who came from a well-known Liverpool family. He had also, I think, begun to feel that the time had come to leave Cambridge, perhaps because Rutherford was reluctant to contemplate the sort of expenditure which Chadwick realized was necessary to carry forward research in nuclear physics. Chadwick’s plans for Liverpool were centred around the construction of a cyclotron which would cost about £5000, roughly equal to Rutherford’s laboratory budget for one year

scholarly journals John Riley Holt. 15 February 1918 — 6 January 2009

2012 ◽  
Vol 58 ◽  
pp. 113-128
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Court ◽  
John Dainton ◽  
Terry Sloan
Keyword(s):  
Cross Sections ◽  
Parity Violation ◽  
Particle Physics ◽  
Muon Decay ◽  
Proton Proton ◽  
Charged Pions ◽  
Experimental Physicist ◽  
Deuteron Stripping ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The University

John Riley Holt was an experimental physicist who dedicated his working life to research in nuclear and particle physics at the University of Liverpool. He was born in 1918 in Runcorn, Cheshire, and in 1938 was awarded a first-class honours degree in physics at Liverpool University. He obtained his PhD in 1941 and became a member of Sir James Chadwick’s team working on the UK atomic weapon project. After the war he developed several new experimental techniques, which he used to make a systematic study of the deuteron stripping process with the use of the Liverpool cyclotron. After the Liverpool synchro-cyclotron became operational in 1954 he initiated a programme of precision measurements of cross-sections for proton–proton and pion–proton scattering. After the first observation of parity violation in 1957, his group completed an important experiment that observed parity violation in muon decay. When the construction of an electron synchrotron (NIN A, at the Daresbury Laboratory) was proposed, he became leader of the magnet design team. As NIN A became operational in 1966, John established a group to measure the cross-sections for the photoproduction of neutral and charged pions. The group then developed a collaboration with colleagues in other universities to measure the spin dependence of cross-sections for meson photoproduction by using a polarized photon beam and a polarized proton target. Before his retirement he contributed to the design of the experiment to determine the spin structure of the proton, performed by the European Muon Collaboration.

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