This Day in Science History

yevaud · Apr 22, 2006

Thank you for the correction, but it would be appreciated if instead of posting to this thread, you PM me instead - I'd like to keep this informational thread as pristine as possible. Thanks, Tel. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · Apr 23, 2006

April 23 People Max Planck Born 23 Apr 1858; died 4 Oct 1947. Max (Karl Ernst Ludwig) Planck was a German theoretical physicist. He studied at Munich and Berlin, where he studied under Helmholz, Clausius and Kirchoff and subsequently joined the faculty.he became professor of theoretical physics (1889-1926). His work on the law of thermodynamics and the distribution of radiation from a black body led him to abandon classical Newtonian principles and introduce the quantum theory (1900), for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1918. This assumes that energy is not infinitely subdivisible, but ultimately exists as discrete amounts he called quanta (Latin, "how much"). Further, the energy carried by a quantum depends in direct proportion to the frequency of its source radiation. Max Von Laue Died 23 Apr 1960 (born 9 Oct 1879) German recipient of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1914 for his discovery of the diffraction of X rays in crystals. This enabled scientists to study the structure of crystals and hence marked the origin of solid-state physics, an important field in the development of modern electronics. Johan Van Waveren Hudde Born 23 Apr 1628; died 15 Apr 1704. Dutch mathematician and statesman who promoted Cartesian geometry and philosophy in Holland and contributed to the theory of equations. Pyotr Petrovich Lazarev Died 23 Apr 1942 (born 13 April 1878) Soviet physicist and biophysicist known for his physicochemical theory of the movement of ions and the consequent theory of nerve excitation in living matter, which attempts to explain sensation, muscular contraction, and the functions of the central nervous system. He trained as a medical doctor in Moscow. In addition, he studied mathematics and physics on his own. His doctoral thes <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

newtonian · Apr 23, 2006

Yevaud - this, April 23, 1500, is more on earth exploration than space exploration - but as Carl Sagan indicated on a recently televised episode of Cosmos, the two endeavors are linked: "On March 9, 1500, Pedro Álvares Cabral set sail from Portugal with a fleet of ships. His intention was to found a trading post in Calicut, India. Before reaching his destination, however, Cabral landed on the coast of what is now the Brazilian state of Bahia. The date was April 23, 1500. Some researchers say that the Portuguese already knew of Brazil’s existence and that Cabral’s stop there was no accident.[footnote:When the Portuguese and the Spanish signed the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494, they divided the land to the west of the South Atlantic. Therefore, some say that Cabral set out to take possession of land that was already designated to Portugal.]" - "Awake!," 5/8/00, p. 16 We are still, of course, exploring earth - both deep sea where new life forms have been found (new to us) and also deep within earth's crust - where life has also been found. "On April 23, 1984, researchers announced that they had isolated the virus that is believed to cause AIDS. In time, an effective test to screen AIDS-contaminated blood may be announced. This, however, is still far short of having a cure for the malady." - "Awake!," 9/8/84, p. 10.

yevaud · Apr 24, 2006

April 24 People John-Charles Galinard De Marginac Born 24 Apr 1817; died 15 Apr 1894. Swiss chemist whose life work consisted of making many precise determinations of atomic weights suggested the possibility of isotopes and the packing fraction of nuclei. He began a study of the rare-earth elements in 1840, when barely 23 years old. In 1878, he heated until it decomposed some erbium nitrate obtained from gadolinite. Extracting the product with water he obtained two oxides: a red one he named erbia and a colourless one he named ytterbia. Thus he discovered ytterbium, and later was a codiscover of gadolinium (1880). By separating tantalic and columbic acids, he also proved that tantalum and colubium (niobium) were not identical. The last 10 years of his life he lay prostrate, suffering intensely from heart disease. John Graunt Born 24 Apr 1620; died 18 Apr 1674. English statistician, generally considered to be the founder of the science of demography, the statistical study of human populations. His analysis of the vital statistics of the London populace influenced the pioneer demographic work of his friend Sir William Petty and, even more importantly, that of Edmond Halley, the astronomer royal. Vladimir Mikhaylovich Komarov Died 24 Apr 1967 (born 16 Mar 1927) Soviet cosmonaut, the first man known to have died during a space mission. He flew on two space missions. He was Command Pilot of Voskhod I, on a day-long mission, 12-13 Oct 1964. For this landing, the spacecraft's parachutes opened at an altitude of 7 km followed by a soft-landing system that used streams of gases from nozzles to reduce touchdown velocity to near zero. Komarov died during the landing after his second space mission, when he was Commander of Soyuz-I, 23-24 Apr 1967, on a nearly 27 hour flight. On its return, his spacecraf <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · Apr 25, 2006

April 25 People Gerard Henri De Vaucouleurs Born 25 Apr 1918; died 7 Oct 1995. French-born U.S. astronomer whose pioneering studies of distant galaxies contributed to knowledge of the age and large-scale structure of the universe. He produced three Reference Catalogues of bright galaxies (1964, 1976, 1991). Each was a homogenization of data from widely different sources, so that the catalogues would not be merely finding lists or data collection lists, but astrophysically useful databases. Using data in the Reference Catalogues, he was able to develop new distance indicators and refine others. His unique philosophy on distance matters was "spreading the risks," that is, applying as many different and independent techniques as possible to check for scale and zero-point errors. Wolfgang Pauli Born 25 Apr 1900; died 15 Dec 1958 Austrian-born American winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1945 for his discovery in 1925 of the Pauli exclusion principle, which states that in an atom no two electrons can occupy the same quantum state simultaneously. This principle clearly relates the quantum theory to the observed properties of atoms. Felix Klein Born 25 Apr 1849; died 22 June 1925. German mathematician whose synthesis of geometry as the study of the properties of a space that are invariant under a given group of transformations, known as the Erlanger Programm, profoundly influenced mathematical development. He created the Klein bottle, a one-sided closed surface. A Klein bottle cannot be constructed in Euclidean space. It is best pictured as a cylinder looped back through itself to join with its other end. However this is not a continuous surface in 3-space as the surface cannot go through itself without a discontinuity. It is possible to construct a Klein bottle in non-Euclidean space. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · Apr 26, 2006

April 26 People Arno Penzias Born 26 Apr 1933 Arno Allan Penzias is a German-American astrophysicist who shared one-half of the 1978 Nobel Prize for Physics with Robert Woodrow Wilson for their discovery of a faint electromagnetic radiation throughout the universe. Their detection of this radiation lent strong support to the big-bang model of cosmic evolution. Dr. Charles Richter Born 26 Apr 1900; died 30 Sep 1985. Dr. Charles Francis Richter was a seismologist and inventor of the Richter Scale that measures earthquake intensity which he developed with his colleague, Beno Gutenberg, in the early 1930's. The scale assigns numerical ratings to the energy released by earthquakes. Richter used a seismograph (an instrument generally consisting of a constantly unwinding roll of paper, anchored to a fixed place, and a pendulum or magnet suspended with a marking device above the roll) to record actual earth motion during an earthquake. The scale takes into account the instrument's distance from the epicenter. Gutenberg suggested that the scale be logarithmic so, for example, a quake of magnitude 7 would be ten times stronger than a 6. Sir Owen Richardson Born 26 Apr 1879; died 15 Feb 1959. English physicist who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1928 for "his work on the thermionic phenomenon [electron emission by hot metals] and especially for the discovery of the law named after him." This effect is why a heated filament in a vacuum tube releases a current of electrons to travel an anode, which was essential for the development of such applications as radio amplifiers or a TV cathode ray tube. Richardson's law mathematically relates how the electron emission increases as the absolute temperature of the metal surface is raised. He also conducted research on photoelectric effects, the gyroma <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · Apr 27, 2006

April 27 People Philip Hauge Abelson Born 27 Apr 1913; died 1 Aug 2004. Philip Hauge Abelson was a U.S. physical chemist who proposed the gas diffusion process for separating uranium-235 from uranium-238 which was essential to the development of the atomic bomb. In collaboration with the U.S. physicist Edwin M. McMillan, he discovered a new element, later named neptunium, produced by irradiating uranium with neutrons. At the end WW II, his report on the feasibility of building a nuclear-powered submarine gave birth to the U.S. program in that field. In 1946, Abelson returned to the Carnegie Institution and pioneered in utilizing radioactive isotopes. As director of the Geophysics Laboratory of the Carnegie Institution (1953-71), he found amino acids in fossils, and fatty acids in rocks more than 1,000,000,000 years old. Mautice De Broglie Born 27 Apr 1875; died 14 Jul 1960. (6th duke) (Louis-César-Victor-) Maurice de Broglie was a French physicist who made many contributions to the study of X rays. While in the navy (1895-1908), he first distinguished himself by installing the first French shipboard wireless. From 1912, his chief interest was X-ray spectroscopy. His "method of the rotating crystal" was an application of Bragg's "focussing effect" to eliminate spurious spectral lines. De Broglie discovered the third L absorption edge (1916), which led to the exploration of "corpuscular spectra." During 1921-22, he worked with his brother Louis to refine Bohr's specification of the substructure of the various atomic shells. He also did pioneer work in nuclear physics and cosmic radiation. Rolf William Landauer Died 27 Apr 1999 (born 4 Feb 1927) German-born American physicist whose discovery of what came to be known as Landauer's principle (that the erasing of computer information causes a loss of e <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · Apr 28, 2006

April 28 People Gene Shoemaker Born 28 Apr 1928; died 18 July 1997. Eugene Merle Shoemaker was an American planetary geologist. Shoemaker initiated and vigorously promoted the intensive geologic training of the astronauts that made them able scientific observers and reporters on moon landings. He was a major investigator of the imaging by unmanned Ranger and Surveyor satellites which, before any Apollo landing, revealed the nature of the Moon's cover of soil and broken rock that he named the regolith. He codiscovered Comet P/Shoemaker-Levy 9 which collided with Jupiter (1994), the first observed collision of two solar system bodies. He died in a car crash. In tribute, a small capsule of his ashes were launched in a memorial capsule aboard Lunar Prospector to the moon. Kurt Godel Born 28 Apr 1906; died 14 Jan 1978. Austrian-born US mathematician, logician, and author of Gödel's proof. He is best known for his proof of Gödel's Incompleteness Theorems (1931) He proved fundamental results about axiomatic systems showing in any axiomatic mathematical system there are propositions that cannot be proved or disproved within the axioms of the system. In particular the consistency of the axioms cannot be proved. This ended a hundred years of attempts to establish axioms to put the whole of mathematics on an axiomatic basis. Bart J. Bok Born 28 Apr 1906; died 7 Aug 1983. Bok was an astronomer, expert on the Milky Way Galaxy and for his study of "Bok globules," small dark clouds observable against the background of bright nebulae. Bok suggested that these globules may be condensed clouds of interstellar gas and dust in the process of contracting into stars. Jan H. Oort Born 28 Apr 1900; died 5 Nov 1992. Jan Hendrik Oort was a Dutch physicist and astronomer who wa <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · Apr 29, 2006

April 29 People Harold C. Urey Born 29 Apr 1893; died 5 Jan1981. American scientist awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1934 for his discovery of deuterium, the heavy form of hydrogen (1932). He was active in the development of the atomic bomb. He contributed to the growing basis for the theory of what was widely accepted as the origin of the Earth and other planets. In 1953, Stanley L. Miller and Urey simulated the effect of lightning in the prebiotic atmosphere of Earth with an electrical discharge in a mixture of hydrogen, methane, ammonia, and water. This produced a rich mixture of aldehydes and carboxylic and amino acids (as found in proteins, adenine and other nucleic acid bases). Urey calculated the temperature of ancient oceans from the amount of certain isotopes in fossil shells. Forest Ray Moulton Born 29 Apr 1872; died 7 Dec 1952. American astronomer who collaborated with Thomas Chamberlin in advancing the planetesimal theory of the origin of the solar system (1904). They suggested filaments of matter were ejected when a star passed close to the Sun, which cooled into tiny solid fragments, "planetesimals". Over a very long period, grains collided and stuck together. Continued accretion created pebbles, boulders, and eventually larger bodies whose gravitational force of attraction accelerated the formation of protoplanets. (This formation by accretion is still accepted, but not the stellar origin of the planetesimals.) Moulton was first to suggest that the smaller satellites of Jupiter discovered by Nicholson and others in the early 20th century were captured asteroids - now widely accepted. Henri Poincare Born 29 Apr 1854; died 17 July 1912. (Jules) Henri Poincaré was a French mathematician, physicist, and astronomer, who influenced cosmogony, relativity, and topology and was <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · Apr 30, 2006

April 30 People Karl Friedsrich Gauss Born 30 Apr 1777; died 23 Feb 1855 German mathematician who transformed nearly all areas of mathematics, for which his talent showed from a very early age. For his contributions to theory in magnetism and electricity, a unit of magnetic field has been named the gauss. He devised the method of least squares in statistics, and his Gaussian error curve remains well-known. He anticipated the SI system in his belief that physical units should be based on a few absolute units such as length, mass and time. In astronomy, he calculated the orbits of the small planets Ceres and Pallas by a new method. He invented the heliotrope for trigonometric determination of the Earth's shape. With Weber, he developed an electromagnetic telegraph and two magnetometers. Robert Fitzroy Died 30 Apr 1865 (born 5 Jul 1805) British naval officer, hydrographer, and meteorologist who commanded the voyage of HMS Beagle, aboard which Charles Darwin sailed around the world as the ship's naturalist. That voyage provided Darwin with much of the material on which he based his theory of evolution. Fitzroy retired from active duty in 1850 and from 1854 devoted himself to meteorology. He devised a storm warning system that was the prototype of the daily weather forecast, invented a barometer, and published The Weather Book (1863). His death was by suicide, during a bout of depression. Events Space Medicine In 1993, an astronaut received a test infusion while in orbit on the space shuttle Columbia. German physicist Hans Schlegel had the saline solution at body temperature pumped into him through a needle. The experiment provided a means to address dehydration and other common space problems such as puffy face and skinny legs. Mendelevium <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 1, 2006

May 1 People M. Scott Carpenter Born 1 May 1925 American astronaut. As one of the original seven Mercury astronauts, he was one of the first humans in space (1962), and he was also one of the first humans to live under the ocean surface for an extended period of time (1965) as one of the aquanauts in Sealab II off the California coast. Johann Jakob Balmer Born 1 May 1825; died 12 Mar 1898. Swiss mathematician and physicist who discovered a formula basic to the development of atomic theory. Although a mathematics lecturer all his life, Balmer's most important work was on spectral series by giving a formula relating the wavelengths of the spectral lines of the hydrogen atom (1885) at age 60. Balmer's famous formula is = hm2/(m2-n2). Wavelengths are accurately given using h = 3654.6x10-8-cm, n = 2, and m = 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. He suggested that giving n other small integer values would give other series of wavelengths for hydrogen. Why this prediction agreed with observation was not understood until after his death when the theoretical work of Niels Bohr was published in 1913. Adam Schall Von Bell Born 1 May 1591; died 15 Aug 1666. Jesuit missionary and astronomer who became an important adviser to the first emperor of the Ch'ing dynasty (1644-1611/12). Grove Karl Gilbert Died 1 May 1918 (born 6 May 1843) U.S. geologist, one of the founders of modern geomorphology (the study of landforms), structural geologist and map-maker. He worked on many U.S. surveys with the U.S. Geological Survey, studying the ancient lakes (Lake Bonneville) of Utah. He was an early pioneer of isostatic theory, made studies in glacial geology and was a close observer of the processes of transport and deposition. He first recognized the applicability of the concept of dynamic equilibri <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 2, 2006

May 2 People Robert Williams Wood Born 2 May 1868; died 11 Aug 1955. U.S. physicist who extended the technique of Raman spectroscopy, a useful method of studying matter by analyzing the light scattered by it. Henrik Steffens Born 2 May 1773; died 13 Feb 1845. Philosopher and physicist, who combined scientific ideas with German Idealist metaphysics. He was a professor of mineralogy at Halle in 1804 and professor of physics at Breslau in 1811. Though Steffens did much sound scientific work as a physicist, he had the fondness ofs a philosopher for using scientific fact as a basis for the construction of fanciful analogies and quite arbitrary metaphysical conclusions. His exposition of a philosophy of nature in Grundzüge der philosophischen Naturwissenschaft (1806; "Philosophical Characteristics of Natural Science") showed a typical combination of profound scientific knowledge and Schellingian speculation. Salomon Bochner Died 2 May 1982 (born 20 Aug 1899) Galician-born American mathematician and educator responsible for the development of the Bochner theorem of positive-definite functions and the Bochner integral. Johann Palisa Died 2 May 1925 (born 6 Dec 1848) Silesian astronomer who was a prolific discoverer of asteroids, 122 in all, beginning with Asteroid 136 Austria (on 18 Mar 1874, using a 6” refractor) to Asteroid 1073 Gellivara in 1923 - all by visual observation, without the aid of photography. In 1883, he joined the expedition of the French academy to observe the total solar eclipse on May 6 of that year. During the eclipse, he searched for the putative planet Vulcan, which was supposed to circle the sun within the orbit of Mercury. In addition to observing the eclipse, Palisa collected insects for the Natural History Museum in Vienna. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 3, 2006

May 3 People Steven Weinberg Born 3 May 1933 American nuclear physicist who in 1979 shared the Nobel Prize for Physics with Sheldon Lee Glashow and Abdus Salam for work in formulating the electroweak theory, which explains the unity of electromagnetism with the weak nuclear force. Alfred Kastler Born 3 May 1902; died 7 Jan 1984. French physicist who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1966 for his discovery and development of methods for observing Hertzian resonances within atoms. This research facilitated the greater understanding of the structure of the atom by studying the radiations that atoms emit when excitated by light and radio waves. He developed a method called "optical pumping" which caused atoms in a sample substance to enter higher energy states. This idea was an important predecessor to the development of masers and the lasers which utilized the light energy that was reemitted when excited atoms released the extra energy obtained from optical pumping. Sir George Paget Thomson Born 3 May 1892; died 10 Sep 1975. English physicist who was the joint recipient (with Clinton J. Davisson of the U.S.) of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1937 for demonstrating that electrons undergo diffraction, a behaviour peculiar to waves that is widely exploited in determining the atomic structure of solids and liquids. He was the son of Sir J.J. Thomson who discovered the electron as a particle. Jonathon Homer Lane Died 3 May 1880 (born 9 Aug 1819) U.S. astrophysicist who was the first to investigate mathematically the Sun as a gaseous body. His work demonstrated the interrelationships of pressure, temperature, and density inside the Sun and was fundamental to the emergence of modern theories of stellar evolution. Events <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 4, 2006

May 4 People Fritz Von Opel Born 4 May 1899; died 8 Apr 1971. German automotive industrialist who took part, with Max Valier and Friedrich Wilhelm Sander, in experiments with rocket propulsion for automobiles and aircraft. On 11 Apr 1928, at Berlin, they tested the first manned rocket automobile. On 30 Sep 1929, von Opel piloted the Opel Sander Rak.1, a glider powered with 16 rockets of 50 pounds of thrust each, and made successful flight of 75 seconds, covering almost 2 miles near Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany, Von Opel as pilot. By sponsoring these early tests of rocket-powered transport, Opel popularized the idea of rocket propulsion in Germany. William Kingdon Clifford Born 4 May 1845; died 3 Mar 1879. British philosopher and mathematician who developed the theory of biquaternions (a generalization of the Irish mathematician Sir William Rowan Hamilton's theory of quaternions) and then linked them with more general associative algebras. In 1870, he survived a shipwreck near Sicily while on an expedition to Italy to obtain scientific data from an eclipse. Influenced by the work of Riemann and Lobachevsky, Clifford studied non-euclidean geometry. In 1870 he wrote On the Space Theory of Matter in which he argued that energy and matter are simply different types of curvature of space. In this work he presented ideas which were to form a fundamental role in Einstein's general theory of relativity. Jean-Charles De Borda Born 4 May 1733; died 20 Feb 1799. French mathematician and nautical astronomer noted for his studies of fluid mechanics and his development of instruments for navigation and geodesy, the study of the size and shape of the Earth. Borda joined the navy, took part in several scientific voyages and played a role in the American War of Independence. He was one of the main driving force <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 5, 2006

May 5 People Arthur L. Schawlow Born 5 May 1921; died 28 Apr 1999. American physicist and corecipient, with Nicolaas Bloembergen of the United States and Kai Manne Börje Siegbahn of Sweden, of the 1981 Nobel Prize for Physics for his work in developing the laser and in laser spectroscopy. Ferdinand Paul Wilhelm Richtofen Born 5 May 1833; died 6 Oct 1905. (Baron) German geographer and geologist who produced a major work on China and contributed to the development of geographical methodology. He also helped establish the science of geomorphology, the branch of geology that deals with land and submarine relief features. John William Draper Born 5 May 1811; died 4 Jan 1882. English-American chemist who pioneered in photochemistry. He recognized that light initiated chemical reactions as molecules absorbed light energy. The Draper Point is the name given to the point at which all substances glow a dull red (about 525 degrees C.). He described the effect of rise in temperature as the addition of more and more of the visible light region produced a white glow (1847). His interest in spectroscopy and photography was applied to give the first atronomical photograph. Its subject was the moon (1840). He also studied photographs of the solar spectrum to show that contained both infrared and ultraviolet light. His photographs of persons include the oldest surviving photgraphic portrait (1840), and he was one of the first to produce microphotographs. Dr. Joseph William Kennedy Died 5 May 1957 (born 30 May 1916) American scientist, one of four co-discoverers of plutonium, (element 94) which was produced from uranium oxide bombarded with deuterons in a cyclotron at the Univ. of California at Berkeley. Subsequently, on 28 Mar 1941, Glenn Seaborg, Emilio Segrè and J <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 6, 2006

May 6 People Robert Henry Dicke Born 6 May 1916; died 4 Mar 1997 American physicist worked in such wide-ranging fields as microwave physics, cosmology, and relativity. As an inspired theorist and a successful experimentalist, his unifying theme was the application of powerful and scrupulously controlled experimental methods to issues that really matter. He also made a number of significant contributions to radar technology and to the field of atomic physics. His visualization of an oscillating universe stimulated the discovery of the cosmic microwave background, the most direct evidence that our universe really did expand from a dense state. A key instrument in measurements of this fossil of the Big Bang is the microwave radiometer he invented. His patents ranged from clothes dryers to lasers. Jack Allen Born 6 May 1908; died 22 Apr 2001. John Frank (Jack) Allen was a Canadian-born physicist who codiscovered the superfluidity of liquid helium near absolute zero temperature. Working at the Royal Society Mond Laboratory in Cambridge, he and Don Misener discovered (1930's) that below 2.17 kelvin temperature, liquid helium could flow through very small capillaries with practically zero viscosity. Independently, P. L. Kapitza in Moscow produced similar results at about the same time. Their two articles were published together in the 8 Jan 1938 issue of the journal Nature. Superfluidity is a visible manifestation resulting from the quantum mechanics of Bose-Einstein condensation. By 1945, research in Moscow delved into the microscopic aspect, which Allen did not pursue. Willen De Sitter Born 6 May 1872; died 20 Nov 1934. Dutch mathematician, astronomer, and cosmologist who developed theoretical models of the universe based on Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity. He worked extensively on <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 7, 2006

May 7 People Raymond Arthur Lyttleton Born 7 May 1911; died 16 May 1995. English mathematician and theoretical astronomer who researched stellar evolution and composition. In 1939, with Fred Hoyle, he demonstrated the large scale existance of interstellar hydrogen, refuting the existing belief of that space was devoid of interstellar gas. Together, in the early 1940's, they applied nuclear physics to explain how energy is generated by stars. In his own mongraph (1953) Lyttleton described stability of rotating liquid masses, which he extended later to explain that the Earth had a liquid core resulting from a phase change associated with a combination of intense pressure and temperature. With Hermann Bondi, in 1959, he proposed the electrostatic theory of the expanding universe. He authored various astronomy books. Alexis Claude Clairaut Born 7 May 1713; died 17 May 1765. French mathematician who as child prodigy was studying calculus at age 10. He was the first person to estimate the mass of Venus to a close value. David Fabricius Died 7 May 1617 (born 9 Mar 1564) A German astronomer, friend of Tycho Brahe and Kepler, and one of the first to follow Galileo in telescope observation of the skies. He is best known for a naked-eye observation of a star in Aug 1596, subsequently named Omicron Ceti, the first variable star to be discovered, and now known as Mira. Its existence with variable brightness contradicted the Aristotelian dogma that the heavens were both perfect and constant. With his son, Johannes Fabricius, he observed the sun and noted sunspots. For further observations they invented the use of a camera obscura and recorded sun-spot motion indicating the rotation of the Sun. David Fabricius, a Protestant minister, was killed by a parishioner angered upon being accused by him as a thief <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 8, 2006

May 8 People John Scott Russell Born 8 May 1808; died 8 June 1882 British civil engineer best known for researches in ship design. He designed the first seagoing battleship built entirely of iron. He was the first to record an observation of a soliton, while conducting experiments to determine the most efficient design for canal boats. In Aug 1834, he observed what he called the "Wave of Translation," a solitary wave formed in the narrow channel of a canal which continues ahead after a canal boat stops. He also made the first experimental observation of the "Doppler shift" of sound frequency as a train passes (1848). He designed (with Brunel) the Great Eastern and built it; he designed the Vienna Rotunda and helped to design Britain's first armoured warship, the Warrior. Eadweard Muybridge Died 8 May 1904 (born 9 Apr 1830) English photographer important for his pioneering work in photographic studies of motion and in motion-picture projection. For his work on human and animal motion, he invented a superfast shutter. Leland Stanford, former governor of California, hired Muybridge to settle a hotly debated issue: Is there a moment in a horse’s gait when all four hooves are off the ground at once? In 1972, Muybridge took up the challenge. In 1878, he succeeded in taking a sequence of photographs with 12 cameras that captured the moment when the animal’s hooves were tucked under its belly. Publication of these photographs made Muybridge an international celebrity. Another noteworthy event in his life was that he was tried (but acquitted) for the murder of his wife's lover. Victor Mordechai Goldschmidt Died 8 May 1933 (born 10 Feb 1853) German mineralogist who made important studies of crystallography. His first major publication, Index der Kristallformen (3 vol., 1886-91; "Index of Crystal Forms" <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 9, 2006

May 9 People Manfred Eigen Born 9 May 1927 German biochemist and physicist who was awarded a share of the 1967 Nobel Prize in Chemistry (with Ronald Norrish and George Porter) "for their studies of extremely fast chemical reactions, effected by disturbing the equlibrium by means of very short pulses of energy." In 1954, Eigen introduced the relaxation techniques for the study of extremely fast chemical reactions (those taking less than a millisecond). His general method was to take a solution in equilibrium for a given temperature and pressure. If a short disturbance was applied to the solution the equilibrium would be very briefly destroyed and a new equilibrium quickly reached. Eigen studied exactly what happened in this very short time by means of absorption spectroscopy. James Pollard Espy Born 9 May 1785; died 24 Jan 1860 American meteorologist who was one of the first to collect meteorological observations by telegraph. He gave apparently the first essentially correct explanation of the thermodynamics of cloud formation and growth. Every great atmospheric disturbance begins with a rising mass of heated, thus less dense air. While rising, the air mass dilates and cools. Then, as water vapour precipitates as clouds, latent heat is liberated so the dilation and rising continues until the moisture of the air forming the upward current is practically exhausted. The heavier air flows in beneath, and, finding a diminished pressure above it, rushes upward with constantly increasing violence. Water vapour precipitated during this atmospheric disturbance results in heavy rains. Gaspard Monge Born 9 May 1748; died 28 Jul 1818 French mathematician who was one of the founders of descriptive geometry (the mathematics of projecting solid figures onto a plane, upon which modern engineering drawing is b <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 10, 2006

May 10 People John Desmond Bernal Born 10 May 1901; died 15 Sep 1971 Irish physicist and X-ray crystallographer who studied the atomic structures of solid compounds. He also performed researched into molecular biology, the origin of life and the structure and composition of the Earth's crust. Cecelia Payne Born 10 May 1900; died 7 Dec 1979 Cecilia Helena Payne-Gaposchkin was an English-born American astronomer who was the first to apply laws of atomic physics to the study of the temperature and density of stellar bodies, and the first to conclude that hydrogen and helium are the two most common elements in the universe. During the 1920s, the accepted explanation of the Sun's composition was a calculation of around 65% iron and 35% hydrogen. At Harvard University, in her doctoral thesis (1925), Payne claimed that the sun's spectrum was consistent with another solution: 99% hydrogen with helium, and just 1% iron. She had difficulty persuading her superiors to take her work seriously. It was another 20 years before Payne's original claim was confirmed, by Fred Hoyle. August Jean Fresnel Born 10 May 1788; died 14 July 1827 French physicist who pioneered in optics and did much to establish the wave theory of light advanced by Thomas Young. John Strachey Born 10 May 1671; died 11 June 1743 early geologist who was the first to suggest the theory of stratified rock formations. He wrote Observations on the Different Strata of Earths and Minerals (1727) and stated that there was a relation between surface features and the rock structure, an idea that was not commonly accepted until a century later. Stanislao Cannizarro Died 10 May 1910 (born 13 July 1826) Italian chemist, teacher, and legislator who recognized the dist <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 11, 2006

May 11 People Antony Hewish Born 11 May 1924 British astrophysicist who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1974 for his discovery of pulsars (cosmic objects that emit extremely regular pulses of radio waves). In late Nov 1967 Hewish and Ph.D. student Jocelyn Bell, by radio telescope, observed an unusual signal corresponding to a sharp burst of radio energy at a regular interval of approximately one second. It is believed that rapidly rotating neutron stars with intense electromagnetic fields emit radio waves from their north and south poles. From a great distance, these radio emissions are perceived in pulses, similar to the way one sees the light from a lighthouse’s rotating lantern. Hewish and Bell’s discovery served as the first evidence of this phenomenon. Richard P. Feynman Born 11 May 1918; died 15 Feb 1988. Richard P(hillips) Feynman was an American theoretical physicist who was probably the most brilliant, influential, and iconoclastic figure in his field in the post-WW II era. By age 15, he had mastered calculus. He took every physics course at MIT. His lifelong interested was in subatomic physics. In 1942, he went to Los Alamos where Hans Bethe made the 24 year old Feynman a group leader in the theoretical division, to work on estimating how much uranium would be needed to achieve critical mass for the Manhattan (atomic bomb) Project. After the war, he developed Feynman Diagrams, a simple notation to describe the complex behavior of subatomic particles. In 1965, he shared the Nobel Prize in Physics for work in quantum electrodynamics. Theodore Von Karman Born 11 May 1881; died 6 May 1963. Hungarian aeronautical engineer who designed the Bell X-1 airplane that was the first to fly faster than the speed of sound. He made scientific insights on the nature of aerodynamics, which he demo <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 12, 2006

May 12 People Maurice Ewing Born 12 May 1906; died 4 May 1974. (William) Maurice Ewing was a US geophysicist who made fundamental contributions to understanding of marine sediments and ocean basins. He worked in a range of subjects, making contributions to earthquake seismology, explosion seismology, marine acoustics, sedimentology, and tectonics. He adapted seismic exploration methods to use in the oceans; explicated a large segment of the earthquake seismogram, the coda; did studies of Earth's free oscillations; and described the ocean sound channel and the dispersion of sound in seawater. He also developed or greatly improved the bathythermograph, the piston corer, heat-flow probes, sonar, hydrophones, gravimeters and deep-sea camera. William Francis Giauque Born 12 May 1895; died 28 Mar 1982. Canadian-born American physical chemist and winner of the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1949 for his "achievements in the field of chemical thermodynamics and especially his work on the behavior of matter at very low temperatures and his closely allied studies of entropy." He is remembered particularly for his discovery of adiabatic demagnetization as a means to reach temperatures close to absolute zero as well as for his exhaustive and meticulous thermodynamic studies, over a lifetime of research, which utilized the third law of thermodynamics while also developing a large body of evidence for its validity. Sir William Huggins Died 12 May 1910 (born 7 Feb 1824) English astronomer who explored the spectra of stars, nebulae and comets to interpret their chemical composition, assisted by his wife Margaret Lindsay Murray. He was the first to demonstrate (1864) that whereas some nebulae are clusters of stars (with stellar spectral characteristics, ex. Andromeda), certain other nebulae are uniformly gaseou <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 13, 2006

May 13 People Stanislaw M. Ulam Died 13 May 1984 (born 13 Apr 1909) Polish-American mathematician who played a major role in the development of the hydrogen bomb at Los Alamos. He solved the problem of how to initiate fusion in the hydrogen bomb by suggesting that compression was essential to explosion and that shock waves from a fission bomb could produce the compression needed. He further suggested that careful design could focus mechanical shock waves in such a way that they would promote rapid burning of the fusion fuel. Ulam, with J.C. Everett, also proposed the "Orion" plan for nuclear propulsion of space vehicles. While Ulam was at Los Alamos, he developed "Monte-Carlo method" which searched for solutions to mathematical problems using a statistical sampling method with random numbers. Otto Heckmann Died 13 May 1983 (born 23 Jun 1901) Otto (Hermann Leopold) Heckmann was a German astronomer noted for measuring stellar positions and his studies of relativity and cosmology. He also made notable contributions to statistical mechanics. In 1931, He proved that, under the assumptions that matter is homogeneously distributed throughout the universe and is isotropic (having identical properties in every direction), the theory of general relativity could result in an open, or Euclidean, universe as readily as a closed one. Heckmann organized an international program to photograph and chart the positions of the stars in the Northern Hemisphere, which led to the publication in 1975 of the third German Astronomical Society catalog, Astronomische Gesellschaft Katalog (AGK3). Alexander Buchan Died 13 May 1907 (born 11 Apr 1829) eminent British meteorologist who first noticed what became known as Buchan spells - departures from the normally expected temperature occurring during certain seasons. They a <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 14, 2006

May 14 People Yuval Ne’eman Born 14 May 1925 Israli theoretical physicist, who worked independently of Gell-Mann but almost simultaneously (1961) devised a method of grouping baryons in such a way that they fell into logical families. Now known as the Eightfold Way (after Buddha's Eightfold Path to Enlightenment and bliss), the scheme grouped mesons and baryons (e.g., protons and neutrons) into multiplets of 1, 8, 10, or 27 members on the basis of various properties. John Charles Fields Born 14 May 1863; died 9 Aug 1932. American mathematician who originated the idea, postumously given his name - for the Fields Medal. It became the most prestigious award for mathematicians, often referred to as the equivalent of a Nobel Prize for mathematicians. As a professor at the University of Toronto, he had worked to bring the International Congress of Mathematicians to Toronto (1924). The Congress was so successful that afterward there was a surplus of about $2,500 which Fields, as chairman of the organizing committee, proposed be used to fund two medals to be awarded at each of future Congresses. This was approved on 24 Feb 1931. He died the following year, leaving $47,000 as additional funding for the medals, which have been awarded since 1936. William P. Lear Died 14 May 1978 (born 26 Jun 1902) American who taught himself electrical engineering and is best known for the Lear Jet Corporation he founded, the world's first mass-producer of business jet aircraft. Beginning in 1930, over a 20 year period, he secured more than 100 patents for aircraft radios, communications and navigation equipment. Lear's other inventions include the miniature automatic pilot for aircraft, the first commercial automobile radio, and the eight-track stereo tape player. Georg Enrst Stahl Die <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

yevaud · May 15, 2006

May 15 People William Hume-Rothery Born 15 May 1899; died 27 Sep 1968. British metallurgist, internationally known for his work on the formation of alloys and intermetallic compounds. During WW II, he supervised many government contracts for work on complex aluminium and magnesium alloys. He established that the microstructure of an alloy depends on the different sizes of the component atoms, the valency electron concentration, and electrochemical differences. Hume-Rothery rules are an empirical guide to when two metals are sufficiently similar to be completely miscible (form a single phase at all relative concentrations). They are: (1). Atomic radii no more than about 15% different. (2). Pure metals have the same crystal structure. (3). Atoms have similar electronegativities. (4). Atoms have the same valence. Pierre Curie Born 15 May 1859; died 19 Apr 1906. French physical chemist and cowinner of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903. His studies of radioactive substances were made together with his wife, Marie Curie, whom he married in 1895. They were achieved under conditions of much hardship - barely adequate laboratory facilities and under the stress of having to do much teaching in order to earn their livelihood. Together, they discovered radium and polonium in their investigation of radioactivity by fractionation of pitchblende (announced in 1898). Later they did much to elucidate the properties of radium and its transformation products. Their work in this era formed the basis for much of the subsequent research in nuclear physics and chemistry. Williamina Paton Stevens Fleming Born 15 May 1857; died 21 May 1911. (née Stevens) Scottish-born American astronomer who pioneered in the classification of stellar spectra and the first to discover stars called "white dwarfs." She emigrated to <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> Differential Diagnosis: "I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are." </div>

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