1949 in science

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The year 1949 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

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Astronomy and space exploration

Chemistry

Computer science

Earth sciences

History of science

Mathematics

Medicine

Meteorology

Philosophy

Physics

Zoology

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Quantum electrodynamics</span> Quantum field theory of electromagnetism

In particle physics, quantum electrodynamics (QED) is the relativistic quantum field theory of electrodynamics. In essence, it describes how light and matter interact and is the first theory where full agreement between quantum mechanics and special relativity is achieved. QED mathematically describes all phenomena involving electrically charged particles interacting by means of exchange of photons and represents the quantum counterpart of classical electromagnetism giving a complete account of matter and light interaction.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Feynman</span> American theoretical physicist (1918–1988)

Richard Phillips Feynman was an American theoretical physicist, known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, the physics of the superfluidity of supercooled liquid helium, as well as his work in particle physics for which he proposed the parton model. For his contributions to the development of quantum electrodynamics, Feynman received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1965 jointly with Julian Schwinger and Shin'ichirō Tomonaga.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steven Weinberg</span> American theoretical physicist (1933–2021)

Steven Weinberg was an American theoretical physicist and Nobel laureate in physics for his contributions with Abdus Salam and Sheldon Glashow to the unification of the weak force and electromagnetic interaction between elementary particles.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Samuel C. C. Ting</span> Nobel prize winning physicist

Samuel Chao Chung Ting is an American physicist who, with Burton Richter, received the Nobel Prize in 1976 for discovering the subatomic J/ψ particle. More recently he has been the principal investigator in research conducted with the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, a device installed on the International Space Station in 2011.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Julian Schwinger</span> American theoretical physicist (1918–1994)

Julian Seymour Schwinger was a Nobel Prize-winning American theoretical physicist. He is best known for his work on quantum electrodynamics (QED), in particular for developing a relativistically invariant perturbation theory, and for renormalizing QED to one loop order. Schwinger was a physics professor at several universities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frank Wilczek</span> American physicist and Nobel laureate (born 1951)

Frank Anthony Wilczek is an American theoretical physicist, mathematician and Nobel laureate. He is currently the Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Founding Director of T. D. Lee Institute and Chief Scientist at the Wilczek Quantum Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU), distinguished professor at Arizona State University (ASU) and full professor at Stockholm University.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rainer Weiss</span> American physicist

Rainer "Rai" Weiss is an American physicist, known for his contributions in gravitational physics and astrophysics. He is a professor of physics emeritus at MIT and an adjunct professor at LSU. He is best known for inventing the laser interferometric technique which is the basic operation of LIGO. He was Chair of the COBE Science Working Group.

The year 1940 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kenneth G. Wilson</span> American theoretical physicist (1936–2013)

Kenneth Geddes "Ken" Wilson was an American theoretical physicist and a pioneer in leveraging computers for studying particle physics. He was awarded the 1982 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on phase transitions—illuminating the subtle essence of phenomena like melting ice and emerging magnetism. It was embodied in his fundamental work on the renormalization group.

The year 1950 in science and technology included some significant events.

The fractional quantum Hall effect (FQHE) is a physical phenomenon in which the Hall conductance of 2-dimensional (2D) electrons shows precisely quantized plateaus at fractional values of . It is a property of a collective state in which electrons bind magnetic flux lines to make new quasiparticles, and excitations have a fractional elementary charge and possibly also fractional statistics. The 1998 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to Robert Laughlin, Horst Störmer, and Daniel Tsui "for their discovery of a new form of quantum fluid with fractionally charged excitations"

In theoretical physics, Pauli–Villars regularization (P–V) is a procedure that isolates divergent terms from finite parts in loop calculations in field theory in order to renormalize the theory. Wolfgang Pauli and Felix Villars published the method in 1949, based on earlier work by Richard Feynman, Ernst Stueckelberg and Dominique Rivier.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of quantum field theory</span>

In particle physics, the history of quantum field theory starts with its creation by Paul Dirac, when he attempted to quantize the electromagnetic field in the late 1920s. Heisenberg was awarded the 1932 Nobel Prize in Physics "for the creation of quantum mechanics". Major advances in the theory were made in the 1940s and 1950s, leading to the introduction of renormalized quantum electrodynamics (QED). QED was so successful and accurately predictive that efforts were made to apply the same basic concepts for the other forces of nature. By the late 1970s, these efforts successfully utilized gauge theory in the strong nuclear force and weak nuclear force, producing the modern Standard Model of particle physics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Clive Ward</span> Anglo-Australian physicist (1924–2000)

John Clive Ward, was a Anglo-Australian physicist who made significant contributions to quantum field theory, condensed-matter physics, and statistical mechanics. Andrei Sakharov called Ward one of the titans of quantum electrodynamics.

Leigh Page was an American theoretical physicist. Chairman of Mathematical Physics at the Sloane Physics Laboratory of Yale University for over three decades, he is the namesake of Yale's Leigh Page Prize Lectures.

The timeline of quantum mechanics is a list of key events in the history of quantum mechanics, quantum field theories and quantum chemistry.

Norman Myles Kroll was an American theoretical physicist, known for his pioneering work in QED.

Alberto Sirlin was an Argentine theoretical physicist, specializing in particle physics.

James Bruce French (1921–2002) was a Canadian and American theoretical physicist, specializing in nuclear physics.

References

  1. Crowfoot, D.; Bunn, Charles W.; Rogers-Low, Barbara W.; Turner-Jones, Annette (1949). "X-ray crystallographic investigation of the structure of penicillin". In Clarke, H. T.; Johnson, J. R.; Robinson, R. (eds.). Chemistry of Penicillin. Princeton University Press. pp. 310–367.
  2. Glusker, Jenny P. (1994). "Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin (1910-1994)". Protein Science . 3 (12): 2465–2469. doi:10.1002/pro.5560031233. PMC   2142778 . PMID   7757003.
  3. "Pioneer computer to be rebuilt". Cam. 62: 5. 2011.
  4. "Today in Earthquake History: August 5". United States Geological Survey. 2009-12-18. Archived from the original on 8 June 2011. Retrieved 2011-07-19.
  5. Cade, J. F. J. (1949). "Lithium salts in the treatment of psychotic excitement" (PDF). Medical Journal of Australia. 2 (10): 349–52. doi:10.1080/j.1440-1614.1999.06241.x. PMC   2560740 . PMID   18142718 . Retrieved 6 June 2011.
  6. Dyson, F. J. (1949). "The radiation theories of Tomonaga, Schwinger, and Feynman". Physical Review . 75 (3): 486–502. Bibcode:1949PhRv...75..486D. doi: 10.1103/PhysRev.75.486 .
  7. Dyson, F. J. (1949). "The S matrix in quantum electrodynamics". Physical Review. 75 (11): 1736–1755. Bibcode:1949PhRv...75.1736D. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.75.1736.
  8. Lanczos, Cornelius (1949). "Lagrangian Multiplier and Riemannian Spaces" (PDF). Reviews of Modern Physics . 21 (3): 497–502. Bibcode:1949RvMP...21..497L. doi: 10.1103/RevModPhys.21.497 .
  9. Pauli, W.; Villars, F. (1949). "On the Invariant Regularization in Relativistic Quantum Theory". Reviews of Modern Physics. 21 (3): 434–444. Bibcode:1949RvMP...21..434P. doi: 10.1103/RevModPhys.21.434 .
  10. Haldane, J. B. S. (1949). "Suggestions as to quantitative measurement of rates of evolution". Evolution . 3 (1): 51–56. doi: 10.1111/j.1558-5646.1949.tb00004.x . JSTOR   2405451.