Robert Hofstadter
Robert Hofstadter (born February 5, 1915 in New York City , † November 17, 1990 in Stanford / California ) was an American physicist . He received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1961, together with Rudolf Mößbauer , for "his pioneering work on electron scattering on atomic nuclei and the discoveries he made about the structure of the atomic nucleus".
Life
Robert Hofstadter was born in New York as the son of Jewish emigrants from Poland who emigrated to the USA at the turn of the century.
In 1938 Hofstadter received his doctorate from Princeton University . During World War II , he worked on anti- aircraft gunshot bodies . In 1946 he came back to Princeton University and worked in particular in the fields of photoconductivity , infrared radiation, and crystal and scintillation counters .
Hofstadter taught at Stanford University between 1950 and 1985 . In 1958 he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences , 1970 to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and 1986 to the American Philosophical Society .
For the measurement and more precise research of nucleons , i.e. the components of atomic nuclei, he used the scattering of electrons , which were brought to energies of over 100 MeV by means of a linear accelerator . At that time, protons and neutrons were still viewed as structureless, i.e. indivisible, point-like particles. With his experiments Hofstadter was not only able to show that protons and neutrons are not punctiform, but also determine their size and the distribution of the electrical charge in these particles. The results were then interpreted to mean that both have a positively charged nucleus, which is surrounded by a double cloud of pi-mesons . With the proton this cloud is neutral, with the neutron this cloud is negatively charged. For this Robert Hofstadter received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1961.
In addition, Robert Hofstadter is the father of the physicist Douglas R. Hofstadter , who was best known for his work Gödel, Escher, Bach .
Trivia
The fictional character Leonard Hofstadter from the television series The Big Bang Theory , a highly gifted physicist, has been named after Robert Hofstadter.
Fonts
- Editor: Electron scattering and nuclear and nucleon structure, Benjamin 1963 (Reprint Band)
Web links
- Information from the Nobel Foundation on the 1961 award ceremony for Robert Hofstadter (English)
- Robert Hofstadter. In: Physics History Network. American Institute of Physics
Individual evidence
- ^ Member History: Robert Hofstadter. American Philosophical Society, accessed October 2, 2018 .
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Hofstadter, Robert |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American physicist and Nobel Prize winner |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 5, 1915 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | New York City |
| DATE OF DEATH | 17th November 1990 |
| Place of death | Stanford , California |