A Conversation with William A. Fowler – Part I

Nobel laureate William A. Fowler recalls his early education in physics; his part in the history of nuclear physics at the California Institute of Technology in the 1930s; parallel efforts elsewhere, particularly at Berkeley and the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism in Washington,D.C.; his contacts with J. Robert Oppenheimer; and his work with Charles C. Lauritsen and Tommy Lauritsen before and after World War II.John Greenberg received his Ph.D. degree from the University of Wisconsin and was Caltech research fellow in history from 1980–1984. The Editors were saddened to learn that he died while this interview was in press. Requests for reprints may be directed to Judith R. Goodstein, Institute Archives 015A-74, Caltech, Pasadena, CA 91125 USA; e-mail: jrg@caltech.edu.     

泡利的科学成就和哲学思想

文章根据国外近期发表的关系泡利的大量文献资料，对泡利作了较为全面的介绍，包括他的物理学成就，高尚的道德品行以及哲学思想，提供了许多有趣的轶事。     

赫兹对阴极射线的实验研究及其重要影响

根据赫兹的日记、书信、文集及相关文献,对赫兹所进行的阴极射线的实验研究工作进行了仔细考察,指出他对阴极射线的一系列实验研究为揭示阴极射线的全部特性奠定了重要基础,对勒纳德和汤姆孙在这一领域的研究产生了直接影响．     

In Appreciation¶A Lifetime of Connections: Otto Herbert Schmitt, 1913 - 1998

Otto H. Schmitt was born in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1913. As a youth, he displayed an affinity for electrical engineering but also pursued a wide range of other interests. He applied his multi-disciplinary talents as an undergraduate and graduate student at Washington University, where he worked in three departments: physics, zoology, and mathematics. For his doctoral research, Schmitt designed and built an electronic device to mimic the propagation of action potentials along nerve fibers. His most famous invention, now called the Schmitt trigger, arose from this early research. Schmitt spent most of his career at the University of Minnesota, where he did pioneering work in biophysics and bioengineering. He also worked at national and international levels to place biophysics and bioengineering on sound institutional footings. His years at Minnesota were interrupted by World War II. During that conflict - and the initial months of the Cold War to follow - Schmitt carried out defense-related research at the Airborne Instruments Laboratory in New York. Toward the end of his career at Minnesota, Schmitt coined the term biomimetics. He died in 1998. RID="*" ID="*"Jon M. Harkness received his Ph.D. degree in the history of science from the University of Wisconsin in 1996. During the spring of 2002, he is an adjunct assistant professor of the history of medicine at the University of Minnesota.     

The Playful Physicist

This interview covers Arthur Schawlows professional life from his days as a graduate student at the University of Toronto, through his work with Charles Townes at Columbia University, his work at the Bell Telephone Laboratories, and into his professorship at Stanford University.This interview with Arthur L. Schawlow is adapted from an interview conducted by Joan Lisa Bromberg on January 19,1984, at Stanford University. This interview is one of some 1,000 transcribed interviews available for study by scholars at the American Institute of Physics Center for History of Physics in College Park, Maryland. Requests for reprints should be directed to John S. Rigden, Department of Physics, Washington University, St.Louis, MO 63130, USA, e-mail: jrigden@aip.org     

A Conversation with Robert F. Christy – Part I

Robert F. Christy, Institute Professor of Theoretical Physics Emeritus at Caltech, recalls his childhood in British Columbia; his undergraduate years at the University of British Columbia; his graduate work with J. Robert Oppenheimer at Berkeley; and his work on the Manhattan Project, first with Enrico Fermi at the Metallurgical Laboratory of the University of Chicago and then as a member of the Theoretical Division at Los Alamos.     

A Conversation with Franco Rasetti

Along with Enrico Fermi, Franco Rasetti played a key role in the rebirth of Italian physics in the 1920s and 1930s. In this interview he talks about his experiments at Caltech on the Raman effect in 1928–1929, mountain climbing, his passion for bugs, fossils, and flowers, and doing physics in Florence, Rome, Berlin-Dahlem, and Quebec. Rasetti also reminisces about the Rome school of mathematics and other scientists he has known and worked with in Europe and in North America, including Robert and Glenn Millikan, Lise Meitner, and O. M. Corbino.     

劳伦斯对回旋加速器的研究

介绍了劳伦斯发明回旋加速器的时代背景与劳伦斯的创新过程,阐述了回旋加速器的工作原理和建造、发展加速器的过程,分析了劳伦斯的成功因素.     

Cold atoms: A new medium for quantum optics

Laser-cooled and trapped cesium atoms have been used as a nonlinear medium in a nearly resonant cavity. A study of the semiclassical dynamics of the system was performed, showing bistability and instabilities. In the quantum domain, squeezing in a probe beam having interacted with this system was demonstrated.Dedicated to H. Walther on the occasion of his 60th birthday     

追念钱临照先生--《钱临照文集》读后感

文章叙述了钱临照教授的科学生涯，展示了他对物理学所作的主要贡献和对现代中国科学和教育事业的发展所起的重要作用。文中也包含了作者的一些个人回忆。     

In Memoriam

I sketch the rich life and multifaceted work of Philip Morrison (1915–2005), from his early life in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and higher education at the Carnegie Institute of Technology and the University of California at Berkeley, to his contributions to the Manhattan Project, his research at Cornell University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology after the war, his subsequent political activity on behalf of nuclear disarmament, his role in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, and his enormous influence as an educator, public speaker, and writer. A.P. French is Professor of Physics, Emeritus, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.     

A Conversation with Robert F. Christy – Part II

Robert F. Christy, Institute Professor of Theoretical Physics Emeritus at Caltech, recalls his wartime work at Los Alamos on the critical assembly for the plutonium bomb (“the Christy bomb”); the Alamogordo test, July 16, 1945; the postwar concerns of ALAS (Association of Los Alamos Scientists); his brief return to the University of Chicago and move to Caltech; friendship with and later alienation from Edward Teller; work with Charles and Tommy Lauritsen and William A. Fowler in Caltech’s Kellogg Radiation Laboratory; Freeman Dyson’s Orion Project; work on the meson and RR Lyrae stars; fellowship at Cambridge University; 1950s Vista Project at Caltech; his opposition to the Strategic Defense Initiative; and his post-retirement work for the National Research Council’s Committee on Dosimetry and on inertial-confinement fusion.     

Fluctuations of a flux driven interface

We investigate a low temperature lattice gas with short range attractive forces. Boundary chemical potentials are imposed in such a way that a sharp interface separates low and high density domains and such that there is a constant mass flux perpendicular to this interface. From a continuum theory (fluctuating hydrodynamics) we determine the interface fluctuations in this nonequilibrium steady state. They turn out to be reduced as compared to thermal equilibrium.Dedicated to Herbert Wagner on the occasion of his 60th birthday and in respect for his service to the statistical physics community     

A Conversation with William A. Fowler – Part II

Physicist William A.Fowler initiated an experimental program in nuclear astrophysics after World War II. He recalls here the Steady State versus Big Bang controversy and his celebrated collaboration with Fred Hoyle and Geoffrey and Margaret Burbidge on nucleosynthesis in stars. He also comments on the shift away from nuclear physics in universities to large accelerators and national laboratories.John Greenberg received his Ph.D. degree from the University of Wisconsin and was Caltech research fellow in history from 1980–1984. The Editors were saddened to learn that he died while this interview was in press. Requests for reprints may be directed to Judith R. Goodstein, Institute Archives 015A-74, Caltech, Pasadena, CA 91125 USA; e-mail: jrg@caltech.edu.     

A Conversation with Lee Alvin DuBridge - Part II

Physicist Lee A. DuBridge became president of the California Institute of Technology in 1946. In this interview he recalls his dealings at Caltech with Linus Pauling; his memories of George W. Beadle, Theodore von Kármán, and J. Robert Oppenheimer; the military Vista Project at Caltech; and the difficulties surrounding the deportation of Hsue-Shen Tsien, Caltech's Goddard Professor of Jet Propulsion.     

A catching trapp for all antiproton seasons

We describe the origin, development, and status of the Los Alamos antiproton catching trap. Originally designed for the antiproton gravity experiment, it now is clear that this device can be a source of low-energy antiprotons for a wide range of physics, both on site, at CERN, and also off site.We hope that the exciting physics that is now possible with captured and cooled antiprotons reflects well on the spirit that H. Walther has shown in his work. Most of all, we wish to join in on the admiring congratulations to H. Walther on the occasion of his 60th birthday Ach ihr Götter große Götter In dem weite Himmel droben Gäbet Ihr uns auf der Erde festen Sinn und guten Muten,... - Menschengefühl, Goethe     

Berkeley and Its Physics Heritage

I first sketch the settlement of Berkeley, California, the founding of the University of California at Berkeley, and the origin of its Department of Physics. I then discuss the pivotal role that Ernest O. Lawrence (1901–1958) and his invention and subsequent development of the cyclotron played in physics at Berkeley after his arrival there in 1928 through the Second World War and beyond. I close by commenting on the Lawrence Hall of Science, the educational center and science museum conceived as a living memorial to Lawrence.     

An analytical model for evaporative cooling of atoms

Evaporative cooling of trapped atoms is described as a sequence of truncation of the high-energy tail of the thermal distribution followed by collisional relaxation. This model is solved analytically for arbitrary power-law potentials. The threshold density for accelerated evaporation is. found to be lowest in a three-dimensional linear potential.Dedicated to H. Walther on the occasion of his 60th birthday     

Anti-stealth: WKB grapples with a corner

We show how the Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin (WKB) approximation works for potentials with sharp corners.Dedicated to H. Walther on the of occasion his 60th birthday     

A Modified Protocol of Quantum Key Distribution Based on Entanglement Swapping

By comparing Cabello＇s addendum to his quantum key distribution protocol [Phys. Rev. A 64 （2001） 024301], we propose a more convenient modified protocol based on the entanglement swapping which is secure against the eavesdropping strategy addressed by Zhang et al. [Phys. Rev. A 63 （2001）036301] and other existing types of attack.