(Drivebycuriosity) - The ancient greeks believed that the physical universe is composed of fundamental, indivisible, and indestructible components called "atomos". They got wronged by modern physicists who discovered that atoms are clusters of numerous elementary particles.
The German scientist Max Planck won the 1918 Nobel Price in Physics because he realized that energy is radiated in discrete, finite packets called "quanta" and created the basis for the modern quantum theory. The scientist Niels Bohr earned the 1922 Nobel Price in Physics because he explained the structure of atoms and described how electrons orbit the nucleus in specific shells.
Planck & Bohr outline in their book "Quantum Theory" (201 pages amazon) how they and other physicists explored the nature of matter, energy, and radiation and how they detected some of the mysteries of the world of elementary particles. It is fascinating to read the work of 2 geniuses and to have sometimes the feeling to get at least a glint of the weird world of quanta.
No comments:
Post a Comment