J. J. Thomson

Robert Millikan and the Millikan experiment

Robert Millikan and the Millikan experiment

On December 19, 1953, US-American physicist and Nobel laureate Robert Andrews Millikan passed away. Millikan was honored with the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1923 for his measurement of the elementary electronic charge and for his work on the photoelectric effect. Millikan‘s famous oil-drop experiment (1911) was far superior to previous determinations of the charge of an electron, and further showed that the electron was a fundamental, discrete particle. In later work,…
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Max Born and the statistical interpretation of the Wave Function

Max Born and the statistical interpretation of the Wave Function

On December 11, 1882, German physicist, mathematician, and Nobel Laureate Max Born was born, who was instrumental in the development of quantum mechanics. He also made contributions to solid-state physics and optics and supervised the work of a number of notable physicists in the 1920s and 1930s. “Can we call something with which the concepts of position and motion cannot be associated in the usual way, a thing, or a particle? And if…
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Francis William Aston and the Mass Spectrograph

Francis William Aston and the Mass Spectrograph

On September 1, 1877, English chemist, physicist, and Nobel Laureate Francis William Aston was born. Aston won the 1922 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his discovery, by means of his mass spectrograph, of isotopes, in a large number of non-radioactive elements, and for his enunciation of the whole number rule. Francis William Aston – Early Years Francis William Aston was born in Harborne, now part of Birmingham, UK, as the third child and second…
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Sir William Crookes and the Fundamentals of Luminescence

Sir William Crookes and the Fundamentals of Luminescence

On June 17, 1832, British physicist, chemist, science journalist, and parapsychologist Sir William Crookes was born. Crookes visualized cathode rays, discovered the fundamentals of luminescence and isotopes, and developed methods for detecting ionizing radiation. He discovered the chemical element thallium and the thorium isotope 234Th. William Crookes – Biographical Background William Crookes was born in London, the eldest son of the second wife of Joseph Crookes, a very wealthy tailor. He attended…
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J. J. Thomson and the Existence of the Electron

J. J. Thomson and the Existence of the Electron

On April 30, 1897, English physicist Joseph John Thomson gave the first experimental proof of the electron, which had been already theoretically predicted by Johnstone Stoney. Thomson was awarded the 1906 Nobel Prize in Physics for the discovery of the electron and for his work on the conduction of electricity in gases. “As the cathode rays carry a charge of negative electricity, are deflected by an electrostatic force as if they were negatively electrified,…
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The Birth of the Transistor, Key Component of Modern Electronics

The Birth of the Transistor, Key Component of Modern Electronics

On December 22, 1947, John Bardeen, Walter Brattain and William Shockley at ATT‘s Bell Labs developed the first transistor, the key active component in practically all modern electronics. Vacuum Tubes as Predecessor of Transistors The transistor is a three terminal, solid state electronic device. In a three terminal device one can control electric current or voltage between two of the terminals by applying an electric current or voltage to the third terminal.…
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Ernest Rutherford Discovers the Nucleus

Ernest Rutherford Discovers the Nucleus

On December 20, 1910, New Zealand born physicist Ernest Rutherford made his seminal gold foil experiment which led to first insight about the nature of the inner structure of the atom and to the postulation of Rutherford‘s concept of the “nucleus“, his greatest contribution to physics. Most interestingly, Rutherford made his greatest discovery after receiving the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1908. “When we have found how the nucleus of atoms is…
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Emil Wiechert – Mapping the Inner Structure of the Earth

Emil Wiechert – Mapping the Inner Structure of the Earth

On December 26, 1861, German geophysicist Emil Johann Wiechert was born. Wiechert made many contributions to both fields, including presenting the first verifiable model of a layered structure of the Earth and being among the first to discover the electron. He invented the “inverted pendulum” seismograph, (an improvement still incorporated in today’s instruments), with which he was able to detect some of the Earth‘s inner structure. He suggested the Earth has an inner,…
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