Vol 23 No 1&2

Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 5-15

Memories of Julian Schwinger

Edward Gerjuoy

*University of Pittsburgh Department of Physics and Astronomy,
Pittsburgh, PA 15260, USA

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The career and accomplishments of Julian Schwinger, who shared the Nobel Prize for physics in 1965, have been reviewed in numerous books and articles.^† For this reason these Memories, which seek to convey a sense of Schwinger’s remarkable talents as a physicist, concentrate primarily (though not entirely) on heretofore unpublished pertinent recollections of the youthful Schwinger by this writer, who first encountered Schwinger in 1934 when they both were undergraduates at the City College of New York. © Anita Publications. All rights are reserved.

Total Ref : 35

Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 17-26

Ralph A Alpher, George Antonovich Gamow, and the Prediction of the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation

Victor S Alpher

Austin, Texas, USA

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The first prediction of the existence of “relict radiation” or radiation remaining from the “Big Bang” was made in 1948. This derived from the seminal dissertation work of Ralph A. Alpher. He was a doctoral student of George A. Gamow and developed several critical advances in cosmology in late 1946, 1947, and 1948. Alpher developed the ideas of “hot” big bang cosmology to a high degree of physical precision, and was the first to present the idea that radiation, not matter, predominated the early universal adiabatic expansion first suggested by A. Friedmann in the early 1920s. Alpher & Herman predicted the residual relict black-body temperature in 1948 and 1949 at around 5 K. However, to this day, this prediction, and other seminal ideas in big bang cosmology, have often been attributed erroneously to the better-known George A. Gamow. This article reviews some of the more egregious and even farcical errors in the scholarly literature about Ralph A. Alpher and his place in the history of big bang cosmology. Two such errors are that (a) Alpher was a fictive person; or (b) that like the French mathematician Nicolas Bourbaki, Alpher was as “conglomerate” of theoreticians.©Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

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Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 27-42

Chandrasekhara Venkatraman (C V Raman) and the Light Scattering Effect He discovered

Anant Krishna Ramdas and Aiyasami Jayaraman

Lark-Horovitz Distinguished Professor, Department of Physics, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA

Retired Scientist of Bell Laboratories, 15906 Lahinch Circle, Odessa, Florida 33556, USA

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In this article we present a brief life history and scientific work of C V Raman, his discovery of the Light Scattering Effect on February 28, 1928, that goes by the name Raman Effect, and his getting the Nobel Prize for physics in 1930 for it. He was the first Asian to receive this prize. Raman created many scientific Institutions and trained generations of students in his Laboratory, both in Calcutta and Bangalore. He was a charismatic scientist of India and a superb Spokesman for science. © Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Total Refs 21

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Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 43-46

A Significant Discovery in Nuclear Physics

Dwarka Bose

Former Professor, Indian Institute of Science and Professor and Dean, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur.

Presently Honorary Visiting Professor, St Xavier’s College, Kolkata, India

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The thirties and forties of the last century saw a flurry of activity and major discoveries in nuclear physics. Although the centre of such research was mainly Europe, there were isolated instances of inspired individuals who made significant contributions. Shyamadas Chatterjee, better known as S.D. Chatterjee, was one such individual working on his own in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India who discovered spontneous fission of Uranium and determined the half-life almost at the same time as Flerov and Petrzhak in the USSR. This article relates the social context of this discovery together with his other contributions such as setting up one of the first cloud chambers in India and his discovery of Helium in hot springs in West Bengal. © Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Total Refs : 3

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Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 47-54

Physics at Fisk University

Nelson Fuson¹ and Ronald E Mickens^2*

¹Department of Physics, Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee 37203, USA

²Department of Physics Clark Atlanta University, Atlanta, Georgia 30314, USA

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Our goal is to provide a summary of the major physics related activities at Fisk University. Almost from its genesis in 1929, the Physics Department has provided a venue for the performance of internationally recognized research in several areas of the molecular and material sciences. What is remarkable about these achievements is that they took place at a university started for freed slaves at the end of the American Civil War (1860-1864), and for which most of its existence as an institute of higher learning, the total student population was less than a thousand individuals.© Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Fisk University, Physics Department, Infrared Spectroscopy Research Laboratory, R&D 100 Awards.

Total Refs : 8

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Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 55-80

Dennis Sciama and the Steady State Universe

J Christopher Hunt

Department of Physical Sciences and Engineering Prince George’s Community College

301 Largo Road, Largo, MD 20774-2199, USA

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Dennis Sciama (1926-1999) was a long-standing advocate of the steady state cosmology, proposed in 1948. This essay explores Sciama’s reasons for adopting the theory, his original contributions to it, his defenses of it, and finally his rejection of it in 1966. Contrary to the image of a scientist as a detached investigator, Sciama fervently hoped the steady state model to be correct, and was significantly motivated by factors often considered to be “extrascientific.” Also, in contrast to the naïve falsificationism usually presented as a virtue of the scientific method, Sciama went through a several-year period of attempting to “save” the model from hostile data. Simultaneously, Sciama’s ultimate abandonment of the theory also stands as a counterexample to irrationalist criticisms of science, such as the Duhem-Quine Thesis and Planck’s Principle. Sciama’s conversion also sheds light on the iterative process that scientists use to attempt to repair faults in their theories.© Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Total Refs : 91

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Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 81-90

The Scientific Impact of Einstein's visit to Argentina, in 1925

Alejandro Gangui¹ and Eduardo L Ortiz²

¹Instituto de Astronomía y Física del Espacio, Conicet and University of Buenos Aires,
CC 67, Suc 28, 1428 Buenos Aires, Argentina

²Imperial College, London, South Kensington campus, London SW7 2AZ, England

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The arrival of Albert Einstein in Argentina in 1925 had an impact, equally relevant, on the scientific community and on the general public. In this paper we discuss that visit from three different perspectives. Firstly, we consider the conditions that allowed for such visit to be possible. Then we focus on the institutional actors that facilitated it, as well as on the expertise and written references on topics related to relativity theory circulating at the time in the local community. In the last section we consider the implications of that visit for the local scientific environment. © Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Total Refs : 23

Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 91-100

Anybody But Hubble!

Virginia Trimble

Department of Physics and Astronomy

University of California, Irvine, CA 92697-4575, USA

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The recent literature of history of astronomy and cosmology has included a good many suggestions for “who first recognized the expansion of the universe?” with cases having been made for Lemaître, Lundmark, de Sitter, Slipher, Shapley, Friedmann, Wirtz and perhaps others. I will touch on these but also mention others (some of whose names have not come down to us) who might reasonably be credited © Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 101-106

Albert Michelson, the Michelson-Morley experiment, and the dichotomy between megaprojects and table-top science

Philip L Taylor

Department of Physics, Case Western Reserve University Cleveland, Ohio 44106-7079, USA

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During the past 130 years the range of sizes and costs for scientific apparatus has expanded enormously. While some groundbreaking science is still done at modest cost, other experiments now require several billions of dollars to achieve their goals. A description of some significant milestones in the career of Albert Abraham Michelson illustrates how in this one individual’s life this divergence may have had its first exemplar, as his vision expanded beyond the exquisitely precise interferometer used in the Michelson-Morley experiment to the mile-long vacuum tube used in his later measurements of the speed of light. © Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Total Refs : 18

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Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 107-112

On the determination of stellar masses

Alan H Batten

2594 Sinclair Rd, Victoria, BC, Canada, V8N 1B9

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A brief account is given of the history of our increasing and improving knowledge of the masses of stars. The basis of this knowledge is the study of binary systems, whose existence was first recognized early in the nineteenth century. The earliest determinations of mass were few in number and poor in quality, but we now know the masses of a wide range of stars on the main sequence to within a few per cent. © Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Keywords: stellar masses, binary systems.

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Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 113-114

A Note on the Philosophical Treatment of Optical Instruments: The Telescope versus the Microscope

Thomas Hockey

University of Northern Iowa

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Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 115-138

From the dawn of nuclear physics to the first atomic bombs

Stephen J Woolbright, Jacob P Schumacher, and Ekaterina I Michonova-Alexova

Erskine College, 2 Washington Street, Due West, South Carolina 29639-0338, USA

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This review gives a fresh look at the major discoveries leading to nuclear fission withinthe historical perspective. The focus is on the main contributors to the discoveries in nuclear physics, leading to the idea of fission and its application to the creation of the atomic bombs used at the end of the World War II. The present work is a more complete review on the history of the nuclear physics discoveries and their application to the atomic bomb. In addition to the traditional approach to the topic, focusing mainly on the fundamental physics discoveries in Europe and on the Manhattan Project in the United States, the nuclear research in Japan is also emphasized. Along with that, a review of the existing credible scholar publications, providing evidence for possible atomic bomb research in Japan, is provided. Proper credit is given to the women physicists, whose contributions had not always been recognized. Considering the historical and political situation at the time of the scientific discoveries, thought-provoking questions about decision-making, morality, and responsibility are also addressed. We hope that this work, referring to the contributions of over 20 Nobel Prize winners, will be inspirational and will stimulate interest in the history of physics not only in physicists but in other readers of all backgrounds, genders, and generations. © Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Total refs : 77

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Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 139-144

A mixture of ancient and modern understanding concerning the distance and motion of the moon

Kevin Krisciunas

George P and Cynthia Woods Mitchell Institute for Fundamental Physics and Astronomy, Texas A & M University, Department of Physics and Astronomy, 4242 TAMU, College Station, Texas 77843, USA

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Ptolemy's model of the Moon's motion implied that its distance varies by nearly a factor of two, implying that its angular size should also vary by nearly a factor of two. We present an analysis of 100 naked eye observations of the Moon's angular size obtained over 1145 days, showing regular variations of at least 3 arc minutes. Thus, ancient astronomers could have shown that a key implication of Ptolemy's model was wrong. In modern times we attribute the variation of distance of the Moon to the combined effect of the eccentricity of the Moon's orbit and the pertur-bing effect of the Sun on the Earth-Moon system. We show graphically how this affects the ecliptic longitudes and radial distance of the Moon. The longitude and distance “anomalies” are correlated with the Moon's phase. This is illustrated without any complex equations or geometry. © Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Total Refs : 9

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Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 145-170

Early Astronomical Tests of General Relativity: the gravitational deflection of light

Keith John Treschman

51 Granville Street Wilston 4051 Australia 61-7-38562262

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One of three astronomical tests of the general relativity theory of Einstein was the gravitational deflection of light. The British total solar eclipse of 1919 is lauded in history as having decided the case in favour of Einstein. This conclusion is questioned in the light of the philosophy of Science and the method employed to analyse the results. The case is put that more emphasis ought be placed on the outcome of the 1922 total solar eclipse in Australia where eight parties attempted measurements of light deflection in the vicinity of the Sun. Importance is attached to Campbell of the Lick Observatory, camped at Western Australia. His results were not completed until 1928. Other leaders, their affiliation and place of observation were Spencer Jones of the Royal Greenwich Observatory on Christmas Island, Freundlich for a German-Dutch expedition to Christmas Island, Evershed of the Kodaikanal Observatory in India also set up inWestern Australia, Chant of the University of Toronto measuring at Western Australia, Dodwell of the Adelaide Observatory in a remote part of South Australia and Cooke from the Sydney Observatory and Baldwin of the Melbourne Observatory both in Queensland. ©Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Total Refs : 106

Asian Journal of Physics Vol. 23, No. 1 & 2 (2014) 171-188

Early Astronomical Tests of General Relativity: The anomalous advance in the perihelion

of Mercury and gravitational redshift

Keith John Treschman

51 Granville Street Wilston 4051 Australia 61-7-38562262

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There were three astronomical tests of general relativity. Besides the gravitational bending of light, there werethe anomalous advance of the perihelion of Mercury and gravitational redshift. The early history of these latter two tests is addressed here. For Mercury, data for its position were obtained principally from transit phenomena. Le Verrier was the first to account for the known perturbation effects on the elliptical orbit of Mercury and calculated an unexplained discrepancy. This was supported by Newcomb who revised the figure. With the use of his general theory of relativity, Einstein appeared to calculate this disagreement from Newtonian principles. Yet, other avenues needed to be explored before an acceptance of general relativity as a reasonable paradigm. This is part of a more general query of when should scientists endorse a theory.

For the test of the redshift of radiation in the presence of a gravitational field, support for this phenomenon followed a winding route. Many factors, which could contribute to the redshift of spectral lines needed to be nominated, and their individual contribution, if any, had to be teased from the rest. Very small measurements had to be effected. This situation received some respite when measurements moved from the Sun to large mass objects such as white dwarfs which theory suggested should have a much larger redshift. 1928 was taken as the year in which the results could be interpreted as support for general relativity. However, developments opened up subsequently and further confirmation has continued to the present day. The story is threaded with a theme that new ideas in science follow anything but a straightforward course and that real history is much more interesting. ©Anita Publications. All rights reserved.

Total Refs: 78

ASIAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICS