William Frederick Meggers

William Frederick Meggers (born July 13, 1888 in Clintonville , Wisconsin , † November 19, 1966 ) was an American physicist who specialized in the field of spectroscopy .

He had to work on his parents' farm during his school days, but soon received a scholarship to Ripon College . In 1910 he earned a bachelor's degree in physics and worked as a research assistant. After a few years at the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh , he joined the National Bureau of Standards in 1914 (today, since 1988 or 1989: National Institute of Standards and Technology). While working there, he received a PhD from Johns Hopkins University .

From May 1945, Meggers experimented with the green light of a well-defined wavelength (546.1 nm) of the gas discharge in the vapor of the mercury isotope 198. In 1951, NBS / NIST had already delivered 13 "Meggers lamps" to scientific institutions and industrial laboratories around the world To define meters in the future using this wavelength of light, but the project was not completed. In 1960 a gas discharge light source based on krypton-86 (605.8 nm, reddish-orange) prevailed, originally proposed by the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) in Germany. Krypton was more readily available in Europe and provided a slightly higher level of accuracy; this new meter standard was adopted worldwide in 1960.

His work in the field of chemical spectroscopy is generally held responsible for an increased interest in this research area within the USA and earned him the designation of Dean of American Spectroscopes .

In 1954 Meggers was elected to the National Academy of Sciences . Since 1970 the Optical Society of America has presented the William F. Meggers Award for excellence in the field of spectroscopy.

Meggers' crater on Earth's moon was named after him.

Web links

William Frederick Meggers at the National Academy of Sciences

Individual evidence

↑ Note: The stable isotope Hg-198 was generated by neutron bombardment (capture) of gold-197 by means of nuclear reactors and a subsequent decay step with a half-life of 2.7 days.
^ William F. Meggers, F. Oliver Westfall: Meter nist.gov, accessed October 29, 2019.
^ Lamps and Wavelengths of Mercury 198 nvlpubs.nist.gov, Journal of Research of the National Bureau of Standards, Research Paper RP2091, May 1950, accessed October 29, 2019.

personal data
SURNAME	Meggers, William Frederick
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	American physicist and astronomer
DATE OF BIRTH	July 13, 1888
PLACE OF BIRTH	Clintonville , Wisconsin
DATE OF DEATH	November 19, 1966

[1] Note: The stable isotope Hg-198 was generated by neutron bombardment (capture) of gold-197 by means of nuclear reactors and a subsequent decay step with a half-life of 2.7 days.

[2] William F. Meggers, F. Oliver Westfall: Meter nist.gov, accessed October 29, 2019.

[3] Lamps and Wavelengths of Mercury 198 nvlpubs.nist.gov, Journal of Research of the National Bureau of Standards, Research Paper RP2091, May 1950, accessed October 29, 2019.