Moo-Young Han

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Moo-Young Han (born November 30, 1934 in Seoul , † May 15, 2016 in Durham ) was a South Korean particle physicist and professor at Duke University in North Carolina . Together with Yōichirō Nambu he developed the color charge theory in 1964 , published under the name "SU (3) -Symmetry of Quarks". This is an important cornerstone for understanding strong nuclear power .

Life and career

After the Korean War , Han emigrated to the USA in 1954 . There he studied electrical engineering at Carroll College in Waukesha , Wisconsin . After that he went as a graduate student at the Rochester University , where he in 1964 with a thesis on symmetry principles in particle physics at George Sudarshan doctorate was. After three years as a postdoc at various US universities, he became a professor at Duke University in 1967, where he remained until his retirement . For his performance as a teacher he received the Alumni Distinguished Undergraduate Teaching Award , the highest such award at his university. Han was also a strong advocate for the interests of Korean scientists in the United States. a. Founding chairman of the Society of Korean-American Scholars and 1985–86 President of the Association of Korean Physicists in America . In 1998 he received the Global Korea Award for his commitment .

plant

Hans's most important contribution to theoretical physics was his suggestion to introduce a new symmetry and thus a new property (quantum number) for the quarks that were only recently introduced and at that time not yet proven . This made it possible to resolve a contradiction that otherwise arose for the quark model between the observed particle spectrum and the Pauli principle . Han and Nambu had independently come to similar conclusions and published them in a joint article. Together with another proposal by Oscar W. Greenberg , developed independently of the two, this was the starting point for today's theory of color charge.

Han authored several textbooks and popular science non-fiction books, including

  • Moo-Young Han: Quarks And Gluons . World Scientific, 1999, ISBN 978-981-02-3745-5 (English). ,
  • Moo-Young Han: A Story Of Light: A Short Introduction to Quantum Field Theory of Quarks and Leptons . World Scientific, 2004, ISBN 978-981-256-034-6 (English).
  • Moo-Young Han: From Photons to Higgs: A Story of Light . World Scientific, 2014, ISBN 978-981-4583-86-2 (English).

and was co-editor of Nambu: A Foreteller of Modern Physics (2014, World Scientific Series in 20th Century Physics, Vol. 43).

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b MY Han and Y. Nambu: Three-Triplet Model with Double SU (3) Symmetry . In: Physical Review . tape 139 , 4B, 1965, pp. B1006 , doi : 10.1103 / PhysRev.139.B1006 , bibcode : 1965PhRv..139.1006H (English).
  2. ^ The Society of Korean-American Scholars ( Memento August 16, 2000 in the Internet Archive )
  3. ^ Former Presidents. akpa.org, September 2015, accessed October 9, 2018 .
  4. ↑ Newsletter. Association of Korean Physicists in America, November 1998, accessed October 9, 2018 .
  5. ^ ME Peskin and DV Schroeder: An introduction to quantum field theory . Perseus Books, 1995, ISBN 0-201-50397-2 , pp. 546-547 (English).
personal data
SURNAME Han, Moo-Young
BRIEF DESCRIPTION South Korean physicist
DATE OF BIRTH November 30, 1934
PLACE OF BIRTH Seoul
DATE OF DEATH May 15, 2016
Place of death Durham , North Carolina