bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Science, technology, and economic growth
Authors: Hollomon J. Herbert
Published: January 2009

The relationships between science and technology and economic growth are not at all clear to many of those engaged in science or to those who participate in the business of “growing” the economy. It is a strange paradox that, although the human intellect has been capable of great achievements in science and its pursuit, the translation of science to use by society is not well understood. Indeed, the glittering successes of science have dimmed our perception of the details of the complex process by which man's understanding of the universe finally enters the world of industry and commerce.
Technical assistants in physics in the United States
Authors:   An AIP Staff Report
Published: January 2009

Are technical assistants needed in physics? Can an increase in the number of technical assistants help to alleviate the shortage of physicists now and in the years of continuing manpower shortages that seem to lie ahead? What kinds of work can technicians do and how should they be educated? Where can one hire technicians?
The Fermi Award
Authors: Oppenheimer J. Robert
Published: January 2009

The Atomic Energy Commission announced in April that, based on the unanimous recommendation of the Commission's General Advisory Committee, J. Robert Oppenheimer, director of the Institute for Advanced Study, has been named to receive the Commission's Enrico Fermi Award for 1963. The presentation ceremony is to take place in December.
Color centers in alkali halides
Authors: Schulman James H.
Published: January 2009

The Fourth International Symposium on Color Centers in Alkali Halides, held at the II Physikalisches Institut of the Technische Hochschule, Stuttgart, on August 21–24, 1962, attracted approximately 130 scientists from fifteen countries, with almost half of the attendance coming from the US.
Whither graduate education?
Authors: Berkner L. V.
Published: January 2009

The past two years have seen the rise of a vigorous discussion concerning the extent and adequacy of graduate education in the United States. As physicists and engineers, we cannot ignore this discussion in its broad implications, since the natural sciences and the emergent engineering and technology are at the focus of the discussion—advanced training in physics and engineering is at the central line of that focus. This public discussion arises in response to the growth of very powerful social, economic, scientific, and educational forces—all of increasing intensity. Moreover, the emergence of new and powerful technologies out of our successful progress in science is further enhancing the community forces that react back upon us and our activities as scientists.
The new AIP handbook
Authors: Gray Dwight E.
Published: January 2009

What is a handbook? The word “handbook” seems to have received its start in life as the English form of the German “handbuch”, with the adoption not always having received complete approval. In his English, Past and Present (1871), Richard Chenevix Trent refers to this handbuch-to-handbook caper and says, “Possessing the word ‘manual’, we need not have called ‘handbook’ back from an oblivion of 900 years.” James A. H. Murray, in A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (1901), gives the 900 A.D. definition of the Old English “handboc” as “a small book or treatise”.
Ultrahigh vacuum: A survey
Authors: Alpert Daniel
Published: January 2009

Somewhat over a decade ago, certain problems in the physics laboratory led to a major step forward in vacuum technology. These problems were in the fields of atomic collision processes and surface physics, in which it was impossible to obtain either high gas purity or atomically clean surfaces with the experimental techniques available. For example, at a pressure of 10−7 Torr (1 Torr is approximately = 1 mm Hg) of molecular gas, a surface which had been previously cleaned would adsorb a complete monolayer of gas in a matter of seconds. The combined efforts of a number of physicists resulted in a new set of tools which made it possible to achieve and measure pressure two or three orders of magnitude lower than was previously possible: that is, pressures down to 10−10 or somewhat lower. Among them were Nottingham of MIT and groups at three major laboratories: Apker at General Electric, Lander and Becker at Bell Telephone Laboratories, and several of us at Westinghouse Research Laboratories.
Science and research problems of small states
Authors: Tabor David
Published: January 2009

In this article I should like to raise some general issues dealing with pure and applied research and their relation to industry in emergent states. These questions arose after a period as a UNESCO visiting professor in Jerusalem, but I believe they apply in some measure to a wide range of countries at various stages of development. And, although I shall deal with the natural sciences, some of the issues raised may well be relevant to other fields of study. In essence, I wish to ask whether the pattern of research followed in large and affluent countries is appropriate or desirable in small states. Whether I reach any concrete conclusion is another matter: but I hope at least to show that the question should be asked.
The paper dragon…a tale of the times
Authors: Pierce J. R.
Published: January 2009

Once, not so very long ago, a graduate student named Bill Farmer received his PhD in physics, cum laude, from Midwestern University. Some months before he received his degree he had reason to wonder what he should do next.
The work of T.H. Berlin in statistical mechanics …a personal reminiscence
Authors: Kac M.
Published: January 2009

I am grateful for the opportunity to pay tribute to the memory of Theodore H. Berlin.
Particles and principles
Authors: Gell-Mann Murray
Published: January 2009

We know that there are two frontiers in the study of the basic laws of natural science: the frontier of the very large, the cosmos, and the frontier of the very small, the structure of the elementary particles out of which the entire universe is constructed, including us. The combination of these two (at the present time theoretically unrelated, although we hope that this situation won't persist) gives us the basic scientific laws that form the foundations for our discussions of science. The research in both of these fields is necessarily a close partnership of theory and observation, and the availability of numerous experiments in the study of the very small is what has made progress in that field more rapid and more exciting in recent years than progress at the other end. But, as interesting observations of the cosmos accumulate, cosmology too should flourish. One thing that makes the adventure of working in our field particularly rewarding, especially in attempting to improve the theory, is that at this basic level of science a chief criterion for the selection of a correct hypothesis, even more than elsewhere in science, seems to be the criterion of beauty, simplicity, or elegance.
Problems and advances in high-energy accelerator design
Authors: Laslett L. Jackson
Published: January 2009

We are here today to discuss the means by which the development of advanced accelerator facilities can best implement the further exploration of highenergy phenomena. I shall refrain from showing a chart of the type that purports to indicate, by a double-logarithmic plot of available energy vs time, that accelerators of increasingly high energy are inevitable. We might, however, recall the recommendations that the Ramsey Panel submitted a year ago to the Atomic Energy Commission's General Advisory Committee and to the President's Office of Science and Technology. Figure 1 is adopted from a similar diagram in the report of this Panel, whose recommendations with respect to the new facilities required to insure continued progress in high-energy physics clearly attached highest importance to advancement of the “energy frontier.”
High-energy physics: Round-table discussion
Authors: Yang C. N. , Goldwasser E. L. , Fitch Val , Weinberg A. M. , Chamberlain Owen , Pake G. E. , Goldhaber Maurice , White Milton
Published: January 2009

C. N. Yang: We have just heard three speakers describing to us various problems which arise in theoretical and experimental high-energy physics, and in the designs of high-energy accelerators. The problem of the aims, prospects, and the impact of the whole enterprise is a very complex subject. I shall confine myself to a few remarks concerning the historical aspect of the subject. High-energy physics is a natural continuation of the traditional efforts by physicists to study the structure of matter. By all standards of comparison, I think we are not exaggerating when we say that achievements in this line of research have been most spectacular in the past sixty years. At the turn of the century, physicists, as we recall, were just looking at the structure of atoms. Thirty years later, the subject of studies progressed to atomic nuclei, and today we are looking at subnuclear constituents. The increase in energy is equally impressive; in fact, perhaps even more so. We have progressed from a few electron volts to millions of electron volts to today's multibillion electron volts. Reviewing the progress of the experimental techniques that have made possible these investigations, one is deeply impressed by the power and the ingenuity that were brought to bear at each stage of this development. With the greatly awakened interest in science in all nations, with the rapid progress of technology, there seems to be little doubt that new experimental techniques will be developed to meet every new challenge encountered in this enterprise. The impact of these developments on technology, on human affairs, and on other sciences has been important beyond description.
Scientific research at very high pressure
Authors: Drickamer H. G.
Published: January 2009

High-pressure research has undergone a considerable expansion in the past decade, particularly in the areas of physics, geophysics, and geochemistry, and in industrial chemistry. This expansion has been motivated in part by the successful industrial synthesis of diamond, in part by the increased emphasis on experiment in the earth sciences, and in large part by realization of the possibilities of performing experiments with interatomic distance as a prime variable.
PHERMEX
Authors: Venable Douglas
Published: January 2009

Most particle accelerators have been built to perform certain predesignated tasks, sometimes to assist physicists in unfolding nuclear structure or to generate yet a new genus of particles. There is no exception to this convention relative to the special purpose accelerator at the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory. PHERMEX was designed and built not bv nuclear physicists but by a group whose inherent professional interests lie in fluid dynamics, chemical kinetics, and extreme states of matter. These interests have maintained the rigid objectives and provided the purpose and drive to complete this program successfully. PHERMEX is now operating, performing admirably the tasks for which it was designed. Therefore, perhaps it is time to say more about why this machine was built, how it was built, and what is being done with it today.
Future physicists win awards
Authors: Cunningham Donald E. , Snider Ethel
Published: January 2009

The Student Sections program of the American Institute of Physics has been rapidly expanding, reflecting a general growth of interest in physics. There are now 234 Student Sections in colleges and universities throughout the United States and Canada. Through association with their Student Sections, college and university physics majors gain a better understanding of what their life work as physicists will involve and obtain information about graduate-school requirements and employment opportunities.
Fundamental research in underdeveloped countries
Authors: Moravcsik Michael J.
Published: January 2009

The view that basic research in the less well-developed countries of the world is neither desirable nor appropriate is challenged by the author, a theoretical physicist at the University of California's Lawrence Radiation Laboratory at Livermore, who spent the last academic year as an IAEA visiting professor at Pakistan's Atomic Energy Center in Lahore.
Proposed nomenclature for helium allotropes
Authors: Daunt J. G. , Schuch A. F. , Mills R. L.
Published: January 2009

Until 1953 it was not known that more than one allotrope of helium existed. In that year Dugdale and Simon reported the existence of two solid forms of He4. These are the α and β forms in Fig. 1. Then in 1961 Vignos and Fairbank showed that a third solid phase, γ-He4, existed in a narrow region along the melting curve. At the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory the three allotropic forms of He3 shown in the figure were discovered. The structures of all these solid phases have been found by x-ray and neutron diffraction studies and are listed in Table 1.
Superconductivity
Authors: Hart Howard R. , Schmitt Roland W.
Published: January 2009

The number of superconductors known in 1935 was about 80, in 1950 over 100, and when last counted more than 900. Though the growth of a field cannot be measured by a single index, these numbers symbolize what has happened to the science of superconductivity; a sequence of discoveries has steadily enlarged the scope and importance of the subject. In 1950 the isotope effect (the dependence of superconducting transition temperatures on isotopic mass) was discovered, and subsequent advances have traversed the range from fundamental quantum theory to empirical rules for finding superconductors. In recent years there have been such discoveries as the superconductive tunneling effect, quantized magnetic flux, the electromagnetic structure of new types of superconductor, and tunneling supercurrents.
The physicist goes visiting…
Authors: Watson W. W.
Published: January 2009

One afternoon recently Professor David Lazarus of the University of Illinois packed his bag, including slides and notes on his research, drove to the Chicago Airport, flew to Dayton, Ohio, and was met at that airport by Professor David F. Griffing of Miami University. For the following two days Dr. Lazarus was a visitor to the Miami Physics Department under the auspices of the Visiting Scientists Program in Physics, sponsored jointly by the American Association of Physics Teachers and the American Institute of Physics with the support of the National Science Foundation. He reports that the staff of the department and their exceptionally large number of physics majors kept him steadily “on the go”, and that the visit was “a fine and rewarding experience”. The department's report states that they found their visitor helpful, stimulating, and enjoyable, and that the informal discussions with the physics students were a tremendous success.
Tyger hunting in the Everglades
Authors: Brown Laurie M.
Published: January 2009

The Conference on Symmetry Principles at High Energy, held at Coral Gables, Florida, on January 30 and 31, and sponsored by the University of Miami, provided a series of welcome contrasts to those who had attended the American Physical Society Meeting in New York the previous week: the pace, the climate, the beauty of the surroundings, the intimacy and, perhaps, more than these, the style and audacity of the scientific contributions—one has only to reflect a moment on the fevered character of the New York Meeting, then perform a mental inversion, to catch the spirit of the Coral Gables Conference.
The third revolution in 20th century physics
Authors: Stern Alexander W.
Published: January 2009

“Twentieth century physics already has undergone two breathtaking revolutions—in relativity and in quantum mechanics. We may be standing on the threshold of a third.” Thus spoke Geoffrey F. Chew on the occasion of the Rouse Ball Lecture which he delivered at the University of Cambridge on March 12, 1963. The title of this lecture is “The Dubious Role of the Space-Time Continuum in Subatomic Physics”.
Ultrasonics: A report on the 1963 symposium
Authors: McCue J. J. G.
Published: January 2009

The Ultrasonics Symposium seems now to be well established as an annual affair. The 1963 event, held on December 4, 5, and 6, at the Marriott Motor Hotel in Arlington, Va., fully met the high standard set in the previous year. These symposiums, of which the first was held in 1958, are sponsored by the IEEE Professional Technical Group on Sonics and Ultrasonics, which owes its unwieldy name partly to the merger of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers with the Institute of Radio Engineers and partly to its own recent resolve to extend its field of interest from ultrasonics to all sonic phenomena not communicating intelligence to the human ear.
Physics Survey Committee
Authors: Pake George E.
Published: January 2009

A Physics Survey Committee has been organized within the Division of Physical Sciences of the National Academy of Sciences—National Research Council to study future requirements for the support of physics in relation to national needs and to the rest of science. The Committee will seek to identify the most significant research problems in various subfields of physics, as a basis for estimating levels of support necessary to assure the balanced development of the field as a whole over the next five to ten years.
Exploding wires
Authors: Chace William G.
Published: January 2009

The nearly 200 delegates who met at the Kenmore Hotel in Boston on March 10th to discuss the exploding-wire phenomenon were assembled to continue the study of a phenomenon first described before the Royal Society in London in 1773. In the intervening years, such notables as Michael Faraday, Lord Rutherford, and the late John A. Anderson, the astronomer of Mt. Wilson Observatory, have experimented in the field.
A brighter future for synchrocyclotrons?
Authors: Siegel Robert T.
Published: January 2009

On February 6, a group of physicists, accelerator specialists, and interested observers met in Williamsburg, Virginia, to discuss for two days the recent past and immediate future of that venerable accelerator, the synchrocyclotron. This conference on high-energy cyclotron improvement, held at the College of William and Mary, was intended to provide opportunity for a pooling of information which might help determine the extent to which new experiments with 100–800-MeV protons (and their secondary particles) will be possible in the next few years. In this “intermediate” energy region, the synchrocyclotron still reigns supreme, as it has since the Berkeley 184″ machine first demonstrated the success of the phase-stability principle of McMillan and Veksler in 1946. Few changes have been made in any of these machines since they were built, and “one μamp” is still the standard guesstimate of internal proton currents for most of them. Recent events have caused a rustle of activity directed toward greater internal beams, more efficient extraction of protons, and more efficient utilization of secondary-particle beams.
Two decades of high-polymer physics: A survey and forecast
Authors: Busse W. F.
Published: January 2009

The twentieth anniversary of the founding of the Division of High-Polymer Physics of the American Physical Society is an appropriate time to review the progress of polymer physics over the last two decades, and to re-evaluate the hopes of the founders and the present need for the Division. The continuing need for our Division perhaps is best shown by the fact that each of the last two meetings have set new records for the number of papers presented. Much of this progress is due to the officers who have contributed so much of their time and effort to the Division. Those who served in the first decade were recognized in an earlier review. The officers of the last decade are shown in the accompanying table. We are indebted to all these men for their work to keep the Division running, and thus promote the progress of polymer physics.
Comment on “Field structure and electron acceleration in a laser beam of a high-order Hermite–Gaussian mode” [J. Appl. Phys. 101, 083113 (2007)]
Authors: Huang Shihua , Wu Fengmin.
Published: January 2009

Wang et al. [J. Appl. Phys. 101, 083113 (2007)] investigated vacuum electron acceleration by high-order Hermite–Gaussian laser beams. However, we reveal that some of their explanations for their simulation results are not reasonable. We investigate their simulation in detail and discover that the injection momentum distributions in the longitudinal and transverse directions play an important role in inducing the valley that appears in the plot of the ejection energy as a function of the injection angle.
A decennial look at NSF's research grants program in physics
Authors: McMillen J. Howard
Published: January 2009

That a theme or motif can be heard, when a list of Foundation grant titles are read, is due in part to the anniversary character of the year. This is the tenth anniversary of the National Science Foundation's establishment. Over the last ten years the physics grants program in the NSF derived much of its strength from its panels of advisers and proposal reviewers. If one looks carefully at the ensemble of grants made under their guidance one observes a program purpose and program direction that was not always apparent when the grants were handled individually.
High energy physics
Authors: Moravcsik Michael J.
Published: January 2009

Future historians of science will find excellent material for a case study in the development of the so-called “Rochester” conferences on high-energy physics, the tenth of which took place at the end of August of this year.
Education and employment of physicists
Authors: Barton Henry A.
Published: January 2009

Teaching and research in physics are activities carried on by people, so that any one or any organization interested in the contributions of this science must be concerned with the number of people involved. The number of students being trained to each academic degree level should be known and, if possible, related to the ways in which employers of physicists will want to use their services.
Physics in the communication field
Authors: White A. H.
Published: January 2009

For at least two generations the communications industry has interacted very closely with certain exciting areas of physics. The mutual benefits flowing to the technology and to the science, respectively, have been obvious to everyone involved. The central role of the electron tube in the instrumentation of physics and in the communication of information is well known. Solid-state devices are clearly destined for a similar role. This interaction has provoked extensive direct contributions to basic physics, especially in physical electronics, radio astronomy, and the solid state. Several of the contributors have received Nobel Prizes for their work.
Physics and the behavior of high polymers
Authors: Schoenfeld Frank K.
Published: January 2009

A physicist is concerned with the properties of matter and the attendant energy fluxes, but so are many chemists, engineers, and applied mathematicians. Primarily, a physicist tries to discover the simplest, most general relationships to explain phenomena of scientific interest, but so do scientists in other fields.
Physics in the petroleum industry
Authors: Smith Noyes D.
Published: January 2009

Since physics is a science which deals with matter and energy in a fundamental way, it is obvious that every purposeful activity has some relationship with physics. Physical problems of importance to the petroleum industry involve to some degree all fields of physics; my task this afternoon is thus to try to convey to you something of the scope of physical research in the petroleum industry and to describe a few areas of physics which are of particular interest to the petroleum industry.
The role of the physicist in the automotive industry
Authors: Rassweiler Gerald M.
Published: January 2009

Physics has been described as the science of matter and energy. Looking at this in slightly different but analogous terms, the definition encompasses the principal interests of the automotive industry, namely materials and power. As shown in Table I this industry uses very sizable percentages of our total US consumption of certain materials. The materials in this list are chiefly metals but the list could be expanded to include a variety of others such as plastics, glass, and textiles. These materials in the hands of our customers are required to withstand severe mechanical vibration and impact together with a gamut of environmental conditions such as extremes of temperature, dirt, rain, ice, and snow. Thus the materials must be continually improved so that they can meet this service with ever-increasing reliability.
The role of physicists in materials
Authors: Hollomon J. Herbert
Published: January 2009

Speed is characteristic of our age. Speed is important not only to our lives and to our spaceships, but to our ability to bring to social use the important, significant discoveries of science. Physics and the physicist must not only play the traditional role of discovering the secrets of nature, but must increasingly, with all other men, appreciate sooner the requirements, characteristics, and limitations of the application of this discovery to modern living. In no area is the need for speed so clear and important as in the development and improvement of materials upon which our industrial economy is based and on which the defense technology depends. A look at materials development might, therefore, illustrate the vital significance of the physicist in this new accelerating world.
Cosmogenic rare gas contents of iron meteorites
Authors: Schaeffer Oliver A.
Published: January 2009

So reads in part what is one of the earliest descriptions of a meteorite fall. The account continues with a further description of the fall, along with possible explanations of the origin of the stone. Throughout antiquity and during the middle ages there were various reports of stones from heaven. The stones were preserved in museums and religious places. For, after all, a stone from heaven must surely be the evidence of some great force in nature. With the enlightenment of the Renaissance and especially with the cold light of scientific inquiry of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, meteorites were relegated to the ignominy of religious superstition.
The Florence Agreement on the importation of educational, scientific, and cultural materials
Authors: Frase Robert W. , Brown Sanborn C.
Published: January 2009

After several years of delay, the United States seems about to join thirty-one other countries which have ratified the Agreement on the Importation of Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Materials, the so-called “Florence Agreement”. This agreement is one of several international conventions drawn up under the auspices of UNESCO and designed primarily to facilitate the freest possible international movement of persons, ideas, and materials in the fields of education, culture, and science. Some of the other conventions in this series are the Universal Copyright Convention (1952), the convention on audio-visual materials (1948), and the convention on the protection of cultural property in wartime (1954).
Color centers in alkali halides
Authors: Maurer Robert J.
Published: January 2009

An International Symposium on Color Centers in Alkali Halides was held at Oregon State College, Corvallis, Oregon, on September 8–11, 1959. Allen B. Scott of the Oregon State College Chemistry Department assumed the major responsibility for the organization of the symposium, which was sponsored by Oregon State College, the Office of Naval Research, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, and the National Science Foundation. This meeting was one of a series held at Oregon State College in commemoration of the Oregon Centennial, and the welcoming address by President A. L. Strand of the College, in which he reviewed the State's history, was a model of interest and brevity.
Annual Physical Society Meeting Japan style
Authors: Crouch Marshall F.
Published: January 2009

A scientific meeting is a gathering of specialists to participate in an interchange of ideas. The effectiveness of this interchange is influenced greatly by the manner in which the meeting is organized. Administrative matters such as the circulation of abstracts prior to the sessions and presentation of graphs and tables by the speakers are becoming problems of ever increasing magnitude. In the course of attending the Annual Meeting of the Physical Society of Japan held in Hiroshima October 8–12, 1959, the idea suggested itself that procedures were sufficiently different from those in the United States that a brief description might be of interest to readers of Physics Today, and might also hopefully suggest ideas for possible consideration.
The status of women in the professions
Authors: Meitner Lise
Published: January 2009

In trying to tell you about the history of professions for women, I shall deal mainly with the problems of academically trained women because this is likely to interest you most, and is certainly the aspect most familiar to me. Let me start, however, with a few remarks about women's work in general.
Plasma physics (“quantum” and “classical”)
Authors: Rosenbluth Marshall N.
Published: January 2009

First of all I would like to thank our hosts from the University of Washington and from the Boeing Airplane Company. In particular, Dr. James Drummond has labored indefatigably for many months to bring about this conference. I think we have all been impressed by the program he has provided for us and by the general excellence of the papers presented at this meeting. In fact this very excellence provides me with a considerable problem since this field is so diverse and has been so well covered by the preceding speakers. I am faced by a sort of insoluble “many-subject” problem which I can only treat in a very cursory fashion which may best be described as the Random Phrase Approximation.
The visual appearance of rapidly moving objects
Authors: Weisskopf Victor F.
Published: January 2009

I would like to draw the attention of physicists to a recent paper by James Terrell in which he does away with an old prejudice held by practically all of us. We all believed that, according to special relativity, an object in motion appears to be contracted in the direction of motion by a factor [1−(υ/c)]1/2. A passenger in a fast space ship, looking out of the window, so it seemed to us, would see spherical objects contracted to ellipsoids. This is definitely not so according to Terrell's considerations, which for the special case of a sphere were also carried out by R. Penrose. The reason is quite simple. When we see or photograph an object, we record light quanta emitted by the object when they arrive simultaneously at the retina or at the photographic film. This implies that these light quanta have not been emitted simultaneously by all points of the object. The points further away from the observer have emitted their part of the picture earlier than the closer points. Hence, if the object is in motion, the eye or the photograph gets a “distorted” picture of the object, since the object has been at different locations when different parts of it have emitted the light seen in the picture.
An ICXer in Peshawar
Authors: Weber Louis R.
Published: January 2009

“We so often tend to think of economic growth, to which we are all devoted, as an end in itself. It's not. It's a means to an end. The end is human betterment, human welfare,…greater intellectual freedom; greater opportunity to develop the individual and dignity of the individual, that man can become more creative; that his talent which his Creator has given him can be utilized…. We are trying to make a tangible advance down the road which leads to a finer human person in Pakistan—in the villages, in the cities, in the towns….” These remarks by Director James S. Killen at the end of a 4-day All Mission ICA conference in Karachi in April 1959 more than justified our having joined four months earlier the Colorado State University Party at the University of Peshawar, a university which only came into existence in 1950.
1961 competition for physics teaching apparatus
Authors: Kramer Paul , Weiner Nat
Published: January 2009

If one judges by attendance and enthusiasm, many physicists look forward to the apparatus competitions held under the auspices of the Committee on Apparatus for Educational Institutions of the American Association of Physics Teachers every two years as a part of the joint meeting of the AAPT and APS in New York. Fifty-four pieces of new and improved apparatus for undergraduate college physics were exhibited at the Hotel New Yorker this year from February 1 to February 4. Supported by a grant from the Central Scientific Company, the competition was intended primarily to inspire and give recognition to inventive ingenuity in the development of new laboratory and demonstration equipment for physics teaching. With public recognition went certificates and three cash prizes of $500, $200, and $100 in each of two categories: equipment used in demonstration lectures in undergraduate college physics and equipment used in undergraduate physics laboratories. A number of honorable mention awards were also made.
Perspectives in materials research
Authors: Seitz Frederick
Published: January 2009

Modern technology places ever-increasing demands on the materials it needs, whether the use be for systems as prosaic as brick and mortar or housing insulation or as sophisticated as electronic components or reactor constituents. In their quest to meet these demands, the scientist and engineer are constrained by limitations imposed by nature: miracles usually are earned. It follows that the individuals concerned with developing materials must not only explore nature to the fullest in the spirit customarily associated with science, in order to possess the maximum of useful knowledge, but must also be willing to make ingenious but practical compromises with nature in the spirit of a good engineer. Ultimately, progress in the field rests upon cooperation between the scientist and the engineer.
Quantum chemistry and solid-state physics
Authors: Pollara Luigi Z. , Freeman Arthur J.
Published: January 2009

It is difficult to imagine how National Science Foundation money could be better spent than to subsidize institutes, both winter and summer, such as the Winter Institute in Quantum Chemistry and Solid-State Physics held at the University of Florida, in Gainesville, with the cooperation of the University of Uppsala and under the direction of Per-Olov Lowdin.
A report on the NASA conference on experimental tests of theories of relativity
Authors: Schiff L. I.
Published: January 2009

A conference on experimental tests of theories of relativity, sponsored by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, was held at Stanford University on July 20 and 21, 1961. The chairman of the conference was the late H. P. Robertson* (California Institute of Technology), and local arrangements were managed by R. T. Jones (NASA). About 35 scientists attended, representing half as many different institutions. The group was small enough so that all sessions could be handled quite informally. Only six papers were prepared in advance, and most of those present participated in discussion of these and related matters.
The scientific objectives of the Able-5 Program
Authors: Altshuler Saul , Lindner John , Schweizer Felix , Wagner Richard , Condon Richard
Published: January 2009

The intent of the ABLE-5 program was to place a satellite into relatively close orbit around the Moon. The ABLE-5 satellite has been designed as a 390-lb scientific observatory to investigate some important aspects of the physics of space. It contains flux-gate and search-coil magnetometers, a set of radiation sensors (a plasma probe, scintillation counter, scintillation spectrometer, an ionization chamber and Geiger counter, cosmic-ray telescope, and a solid-state detector), and a micrometeorite counter. The general objective of these sensors is to acquire detailed information about the distribution of magnetic fields, the spectral density of charged particles, and meteoritic statistics.
Physics education
Authors: Buchta J. W.
Published: January 2009

More than one hundred delegates from twenty-nine nations met in the UNESCO House in Paris, July 28–August 4, to discuss problems in physics education and to compare activities in the various countries. The conference was organized under the auspices of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics. Representatives came from Finland and Canada in the north to Australia, South Africa, and Chile “down below”, from Japan, India, Russia, Turkey, and most of the European states. Education at both the secondary-school and college levels was considered with major attention given to the pre-college years.
Physics and engineering in a free society: 3. The public
Authors: Piel Gerard
Published: January 2009

How shall the universities of our free society meet the demand for quality and quantity in the scientific training of the next generation? That question has been well denned for our consideration by Julius Stratton. In the assignment of the next two speakers to the function of representing the interest of industry and of the public, respectively, there is just the barest hint that there might be an adversity of interest here. Since I have brought this possibility out in the open, I should assure you at once of my conviction that what is good for the US is good for General Motors. Moreover, I am willing to go the distance with the former Secretary of Defense and declare that the same is true vice versa—necessarily so in the long run. But in the long run, as John Maynard Keynes once observed, we are all dead.
Characteristics of cosmic radio radiation
Authors: Ko H. C.
Published: January 2009

Cosmic radio radiation is radiation of extraterrestrial origin in the radio-frequency portion of the electromagnetic spectrum. Such radiation was discovered by Karl Jansky of Bell Telephone Laboratories in 1932 on a wavelength of 14.6 m. While studying the direction of arrival of the atmospheric disturbances which interfere with the transatlantic short-wave radio communications, Jansky found that in addition to familiar atmospheric static due to local and distant thunderstorms, his directive antenna was picking up persistent strange static noise. From further observations he concluded that the static noise was coming from the general direction of the Milky Way and the maximum noise was from the Constellation of Sagittarius, the central region of the Milky Way. Jansky suggested that this cosmic radio wave might be originating either in the stars or in interstellar space.
Radiophysics Conference at Pisa
Authors: Ingram D. J. E.
Published: January 2009

During the period September 12–17 a large number of physicists, chemists, and electronic engineers gathered at Pisa to discuss recent advances in radio-frequency spectroscopy. This meeting was of a truly international character, with participants from many Eastern European universities and research institutes, including those at Warsaw, Leipzig, East Berlin, and Ljubljana, as well as members from all the Western European countries, the United States, and India. The 1960 conference itself was one of a regular annual series organized by the European “Colloque AMPERE (Atonies et Molécules Par Etudes Radio-Electriques)” which was initiated some years ago mainly due to the enthusiasm of Professor Freymann, and now has its secretariat headquarters, headed by Professor Bene, at the Institute of Physics in Geneva. The entire planning, organization, and control of the present conference, however, were carried out by Professor Gozzini, of the Institute of Physics at Pisa, to whom very considerable praise must be given for the smooth running of such a large international meeting.
Individual departmental libraries vs consolidated science libraries
Authors: Wells D. A.
Published: January 2009

The merits of individual departmental science libraries versus one large unified library have been considered by administrators throughout the country for some time. It seems that there is currently a movement afoot at a number of colleges and universities for the consolidation of physics, chemistry, biology, and other science libraries into one large unit housed in a separate building.
A guess as to what is science
Authors: McLachlan Dan
Published: January 2009

That the meaning of science is somewhat weakly defined is exemplified by the following popular concepts. “Cavendish discovered hydrogen, De Soto discovered the Mississippi River, and Ziegfield discovered Gypsy Rose Lee.” Only one of these discoveries is considered scientific. By scientific evaluation, the discovery of Pikes Peak has a different rating than the discovery of the Van Allen Belts. When James Corbett beat John Sullivan in 1892, he established a reputation that still holds today, of being the most scientific boxer of all time; and when farmer Jones ran a wire from his house to the barn to attach an incandescent lamp on it in the Ozark Mountains in 1922, he was hailed by the neighbors for being a modern, scientific farmer. Scientific research can be carried on in the laboratory, out in the field, or in the library. Some people will tell you that psychology is not a science while physics is, that mathematics is the only one hundred percent exact science, that genealogy ceases to be a science when the investigator looks up his own family tree, and so on.
Physics PhD's…whence…whither…when?
Authors: Harmon L. R.
Published: January 2009

During most of the decade of the 1950's, the production of physics doctorates was on a plateau at about 500 per year. Recent evidence is that it has begun to climb again, at about the long-term rate of an increase of 7% per annum. The data on physics doctorate output, shown in Table 1 and in Figure 1, come from the Doctorate Records File of the Office of Scientific Personnel of the National Academy of Sciences—National Research Council. Figure 1 is plotted on semilogarithmic paper so that a given percentage rate of increase will appear as a straight line. For the last four years, the increase each year has come very near to the 7% per annum rate of increase, which, over many decades, tends to characterize doctorate output in all fields combined.
High-energy physics: An account of the 1962 international conference, Geneva, July 4–11
Authors: Moravcsik Michael J.
Published: January 2009

If the history of physics is to be classified according to the relationship between our accumulation of information on nature and our understanding of this information, one can distinguish three kinds of periods. In the first, these two aspects of science are even, and the new information is fairly promptly digested in terms of existing theoretical schemes. In the second type of situation, the information obtained is basically new in terms of the theory which becomes inadequate to explain it: a crisis develops. Finally, in the third kind of period, a theoretical “break-through” is achieved, which then quickly makes sense of all the previously accumulated information, and even beyond that makes a multitude of predictions which keeps experimental physics busy for some time.
Laboratory astrophysics
Authors: Branscomb Lewis M. , Thomas Richard N.
Published: January 2009

The development of American astronomy over the last quarter century has been chiefly characterized by the construction of larger and larger telescopes. The size and diversity of those covering the visible spectrum have increased steadily over the period. The radio spectrum has been studied since the war, with telescopes now approaching the size of a football field. Most recently, designs for “space” telescopes, extending the spectral coverage to the far-ultraviolet and x-ray regions, fill the imaginations of virtually all astronomy and “space” departments. The accompanying conceptual investigations have been mainly attempts to understand the evolutionary development of stars and stellar systems—on the one hand, by surveying greater volumes of space in more minute detail, and, on the other hand, by close collaboration with nuclear physics to study the interrelation between possible nuclear-energy sources and stellar structure, along the various evolutionary tracks.
Basic plasma theory—Kinetics
Authors: Frieman E. A.
Published: January 2009

The range of phenomena concerned with the role of collisions in plasmas at high temperatures and how they bring a plasma into thermal equilibrium is nowadays usually called “kinetics”, a word adopted from the Russian literature. In recent years, there has been renewed interest in the subject of deriving kinetic equations, like the Boltzmann or Fokker-Planck equations which describe the approach to equilibrium, from the Liouville equation. In particular, there have been new formal advances in the application of these ideas to plasmas, plus a clearer understanding of the basic physical phenomena. I will try in the following to treat both of these.
Electron and ion resonance in a plasma
Authors: Buchsbaum S. J.
Published: January 2009

Consider a plasma of finite dimensions in a static magnetic field. Assume that the plasma is in equilibrium (not necessarily thermal equilibrium), and that some external force—say, a static electric field—is applied to the plasma at some angle to the magnetic field. Then, as Professor Allis pointed out, a sheath will form at the plasma boundaries, such that, within the plasma, the resulting space-charge field will nearly cancel the applied field. If the applied field is suddenly removed, the sheath will collapse, and this will often lead to natural oscillations of the plasma. If there were no magnetic field, and if the plasma boundaries were planes, the oscillations would occur at the plasma frequency. In the presence of a magnetic field, these oscillations can be very complicated because they involve, in addition to the plasma frequency, the cyclotron frequencies of both electrons and ions. Such oscillations are the manifestation of the many degrees of freedom that a plasma in a magnetic field possesses. Clearly, the understanding of such oscillations is of fundamental importance to the understanding of plasmas.
Dynamics of plasmas
Authors: Finkelstein David
Published: January 2009

Let us begin this sampler of elementary plasma dynamics by discussing one, most characteristic, mode of plasma motion, paradoxically called the “electrostatic wave”. Suppose that all space were filled uniformly by free particles all of one charge q, with a number per unit volume n. These particles are found at time zero with various coordinates x. Let us follow a small motion for a short time after time zero, designating their position at time t by ζ = ζ(t,x). In this extremely simple situation, Newton's laws and one of Maxwell's equations suffice to give a complete solution of the problem. Newton tells us that for each of the particles.
The fluctuation dissipation theorem
Authors: Hoffman Joseph G.
Published: January 2009

In 1928, J. B. Johnson showed experimentally that a resistor with no current flowing in it has a measurable electrical noise across its terminals. The signal of the magnitude of a few microvolts is called noise because when made audible through hi-fi audio amplifier and speaker, it has a high-pitched hissing quality. Noise from a current-free metallic resistor is called Johnson noise, or sometimes thermal noise, because Johnson identified the voltage fluctuations across the resistor with thermal agitation of the charge carriers. His classic experiments showed that the mean-square-voltage noise signal was directly proportional to the resistance and the absolute temperature in various types of solid as well as in liquid resistors.