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Hans Bethe
Hans Albrecht Eduard Bethe (/ˈbɛθə/; German: [ˈhans ˈbeːtə] ⓘ; July 2, 1906 – March 6, 2005) was a German-American physicist who made major contributions to nuclear physics, astrophysics, quantum electrodynamics and solid-state physics, and received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1967 for his work on the theory of stellar nucleosynthesis. For most of his career, Bethe was a professor at Cornell University.
In 1931, Bethe developed the Bethe ansatz, which is a method for finding the exact solutions for the eigenvalues and eigenvectors of certain one-dimensional quantum many-body models. In 1939, Bethe published a paper which established the CNO cycle as the primary energy source for heavier stars in the main sequence classification of stars, which earned him a Nobel Prize in 1967. During World War II, Bethe was head of the Theoretical Division at the secret Los Alamos National Laboratory that developed the first atomic bombs. There he played a key role in calculating the critical mass of the weapons and developing the theory behind the implosion method used in both the Trinity test and the "Fat Man" weapon dropped on Nagasaki in August 1945.
After the war, Bethe played an important role in the development of the hydrogen bomb, as he also served as the head of the theoretical division for the project, although he had originally joined the project with the hope of proving it could not be made. He later campaigned with Albert Einstein and the Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists against nuclear testing and the nuclear arms race. He helped persuade the Kennedy and Nixon administrations to sign, respectively, the 1963 Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty and 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (SALT I). In 1947, he wrote an important paper which provided the calculation of the Lamb shift, which is credited with revolutionizing quantum electrodynamics and further "opened the way to the modern era of particle physics". He contributed to the understanding of neutrinos and was key in the solving of the solar neutrino problem. He contributed to the understanding of supernovas and their processes.
His scientific research never ceased, and he was publishing papers well into his nineties, making him one of the few scientists to have published at least one major paper in his field during every decade of his career, which in Bethe's case spanned nearly seventy years. Physicist Freeman Dyson, once his doctoral student, called him "the supreme problem-solver of the 20th century", and cosmologist Edward Kolb called him "the last of the old masters" of physics.
Bethe was born in Strasbourg, which at the time was part of the Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen, Germany, on July 2, 1906, the only child of Anna (née Kuhn) and Albrecht Bethe, a Privatdozent of physiology at the University of Strasbourg. Although his mother, the daughter of Abraham Kuhn, professor at the University of Strasbourg, had a Jewish background, Bethe was raised Protestant, like his father; and he became an atheist later in life.
His father accepted a position as professor and director of the Institute of Physiology at the University of Kiel in 1912, and the family moved into the director's apartment at the institute. Initially, he was schooled privately by a professional teacher as part of a group of eight girls and boys. The family moved again in 1915 when his father became the head of the new Institute of Physiology at the Goethe University Frankfurt.
Bethe attended the Goethe-Gymnasium in Frankfurt, Germany. His education was interrupted in 1916, when he contracted tuberculosis, and he was sent to Bad Kreuznach to recuperate. By 1917, he had recovered sufficiently to attend the local Realschule and the following year, he was sent to the Odenwaldschule, a private, coeducational boarding school. He attended the Goethe-Gymnasium again for his final three years of secondary schooling, from 1922 to 1924.
Having passed his Abitur, Bethe entered the University of Frankfurt in 1924. He decided to major in chemistry. The instruction in physics was poor, and while there were distinguished mathematicians in Frankfurt such as Carl Ludwig Siegel and Otto Szász, Bethe disliked their approaches, which presented mathematics without reference to the other sciences. Bethe found that he was a poor experimentalist who destroyed his lab coat by spilling sulfuric acid on it, but he found the advanced physics taught by the associate professor, Walter Gerlach, more interesting. Gerlach left in 1925 and was replaced by Karl Meissner, who advised Bethe that he should go to a university with a better school of theoretical physics, specifically the University of Munich, where he could study under Arnold Sommerfeld.
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Hans Bethe
Hans Albrecht Eduard Bethe (/ˈbɛθə/; German: [ˈhans ˈbeːtə] ⓘ; July 2, 1906 – March 6, 2005) was a German-American physicist who made major contributions to nuclear physics, astrophysics, quantum electrodynamics and solid-state physics, and received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1967 for his work on the theory of stellar nucleosynthesis. For most of his career, Bethe was a professor at Cornell University.
In 1931, Bethe developed the Bethe ansatz, which is a method for finding the exact solutions for the eigenvalues and eigenvectors of certain one-dimensional quantum many-body models. In 1939, Bethe published a paper which established the CNO cycle as the primary energy source for heavier stars in the main sequence classification of stars, which earned him a Nobel Prize in 1967. During World War II, Bethe was head of the Theoretical Division at the secret Los Alamos National Laboratory that developed the first atomic bombs. There he played a key role in calculating the critical mass of the weapons and developing the theory behind the implosion method used in both the Trinity test and the "Fat Man" weapon dropped on Nagasaki in August 1945.
After the war, Bethe played an important role in the development of the hydrogen bomb, as he also served as the head of the theoretical division for the project, although he had originally joined the project with the hope of proving it could not be made. He later campaigned with Albert Einstein and the Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists against nuclear testing and the nuclear arms race. He helped persuade the Kennedy and Nixon administrations to sign, respectively, the 1963 Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty and 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (SALT I). In 1947, he wrote an important paper which provided the calculation of the Lamb shift, which is credited with revolutionizing quantum electrodynamics and further "opened the way to the modern era of particle physics". He contributed to the understanding of neutrinos and was key in the solving of the solar neutrino problem. He contributed to the understanding of supernovas and their processes.
His scientific research never ceased, and he was publishing papers well into his nineties, making him one of the few scientists to have published at least one major paper in his field during every decade of his career, which in Bethe's case spanned nearly seventy years. Physicist Freeman Dyson, once his doctoral student, called him "the supreme problem-solver of the 20th century", and cosmologist Edward Kolb called him "the last of the old masters" of physics.
Bethe was born in Strasbourg, which at the time was part of the Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen, Germany, on July 2, 1906, the only child of Anna (née Kuhn) and Albrecht Bethe, a Privatdozent of physiology at the University of Strasbourg. Although his mother, the daughter of Abraham Kuhn, professor at the University of Strasbourg, had a Jewish background, Bethe was raised Protestant, like his father; and he became an atheist later in life.
His father accepted a position as professor and director of the Institute of Physiology at the University of Kiel in 1912, and the family moved into the director's apartment at the institute. Initially, he was schooled privately by a professional teacher as part of a group of eight girls and boys. The family moved again in 1915 when his father became the head of the new Institute of Physiology at the Goethe University Frankfurt.
Bethe attended the Goethe-Gymnasium in Frankfurt, Germany. His education was interrupted in 1916, when he contracted tuberculosis, and he was sent to Bad Kreuznach to recuperate. By 1917, he had recovered sufficiently to attend the local Realschule and the following year, he was sent to the Odenwaldschule, a private, coeducational boarding school. He attended the Goethe-Gymnasium again for his final three years of secondary schooling, from 1922 to 1924.
Having passed his Abitur, Bethe entered the University of Frankfurt in 1924. He decided to major in chemistry. The instruction in physics was poor, and while there were distinguished mathematicians in Frankfurt such as Carl Ludwig Siegel and Otto Szász, Bethe disliked their approaches, which presented mathematics without reference to the other sciences. Bethe found that he was a poor experimentalist who destroyed his lab coat by spilling sulfuric acid on it, but he found the advanced physics taught by the associate professor, Walter Gerlach, more interesting. Gerlach left in 1925 and was replaced by Karl Meissner, who advised Bethe that he should go to a university with a better school of theoretical physics, specifically the University of Munich, where he could study under Arnold Sommerfeld.
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