The Discovery of the Electron site (AIP Center for History of Physics)Introduction -- Gloria B. Lubkin
J. J. Thomson "discovered" the electron a hundred years
ago. Eventually, the accumulating experimental and theoretical evidence made it clear to all but the most obdurate skeptics that there really are electrons -- Allan Franklin
The Discovery of the Electron site (AIP Center for History of Physics)
Puzzles and mysteries abound: Are there more than just the six leptons already known; what is the intrinsic difference between the electron, the muon and the tau; do neutrinos have mass? -- Martin L. Perl
In condensed matter physics, some particles behave like fragments of an electron -- Philip W. Anderson
How silicon MOSFET technology came to dominate the ways in which electrons are used in logic and memory devices; will this dominance continue? -- Alan Fowler
Reaching to smaller and smaller scales, modern electron beams are used for studying atomic arrangements inside solids and for imprinting tiny patterns on semiconductor chips -- J. Murray Gibson
What's wrong with this reading -- N. David Mermin
Quantum oscillations ring out loud and clear. It took a sophisticated instrument---the human ear---to alert Berkeley researchers that the quantum oscillations they sought were indeed coming from their container of superfluid helium-3. Their experiment is a dramatic demonstration of the AC Josephson effect in superfluids.
Exhaustive searching is less tiring with a bit of quantum magic. Quantum computers have been shown to provide a dramatic speedup over classical computers in solving problems by exhaustive searching. For example, the widely used 56-bit Data Encryption Standard could be cracked with a mere 200 million or so computations instead of about 35 quadrillion.
Links to related sites and references
From ethane to benzene through a supersonic nozzle. By exploiting a nonequilibrium reaction, Harvard chemists have found they can readily produce a high yield of unsaturated hydrocarbons starting with a hydrocarbon that is normally rather unreactive.
Intel, Motorola and Advanced Micro Devices enlist 3 DOE labs to develop new computer chip
Peña vows to speed up lab reforms in wake of political sharpshooting
Washington dispatches: Another giant step; Academic research and tuition costs; No ban on NIF
Washington ins & outs: Moore to OSTP, Kammer to NIST and OMB loses two
Countdown for Cassini mission to Saturn begins, as protests over plutonium in space heat up. The last of the big planetary missions, Cassini promises to enormously increase our understanding of the Saturnian system.
Federal court rules for APS and AIP in dispute with Gordon & Breach over survey of journals
Chile rejoins Gemini telescope project as a full-fledged member. Gemini has won tax-free status for the project and diplomatic immunity for its foreign participants---perks that future international observatories in Chile may find hard to come by.
Biologist Baltimore is Caltech president
Web Watch: SETI@home; The Contemporary Physics Education Project; Multimedia Research Papers in Nanotechnology
A Tale of Two Continents: A Physicist's Life in a Turbulent World, A. Pais (reviewed by S. S. Schweber)
American Astronomy: Community, Careers, and Power, 1859-1940, J. Lankford;
History of Astronomy: An Encyclopedia, edited by J. Lankford (reviewed by N. Hetherington)
The Inflationary Universe: The Quest for a New Theory of Cosmic Origin, A. Guth (reviewed by J. Silk)
Nuclear Rites: A Weapons Laboratory at the End of the Cold War, H. Gusterson (reviewed by W. Happer)
Introductory Statistical Mechanics, R. Bowley and M. Sánchez (reviewed by R. S. Knox)
Behind the Crystal Ball: Magic, Science, and the Occult from Antiquity through the New Age, A. Aveni (reviewed by E. C. Krupp)
Astrostatistics, G. J. Babu and E. D. Feigelson (reviewed by D. K. Robinson)
Quantum Mechanics: Classical Results, Modern Systems, and Visualized Examples, R. W. Robinett;
Quantum Mechanics: Fundamentals and Applications to Technology, J. Singh (reviewed by S. Amador)
And our regular sections: Physics Update, Letters, New Products, We Hear That, and Information Exchange.
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