Frontiers: Twentieth Century PhysicsThe revolution in twentieth-century physics has offered answers to many of the big questions of existence, such as the ultimate nature of things and how the universe came into being. It has undermined our belief in a Newtonian mechanistic universe and a deterministic future, posing questions about parallel universes, time-travel, and the origin and end of everything. At the same time we have witnessed amazing attempts at unification so that physicists are able to contemplate the discovery of a single theory of everything from which we could derive the masses and types of all particles and their interactions. This book tells the story of these discoveries and the people who made them, largely through the work of Nobel Prize-winning physicists. |
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acceleration alpha particles amplitude atoms baryon beam Big Bang black hole Bohr bosons charge classical clock collapse collisions conservation cosmic created decay density detector diffraction Dirac discovery distance Earth effect Einstein electromagnetic electron emitted energy entropy equation experiment experimental fermions Feynman field theory Figure force frequency galaxies gravitational field hadrons heat helium helium-3 high-energy Hubble hydrogen idea increase inertial inertial reference frame interaction interpretation kaons laws leptons linked macroscopic magnetic field mass matter measurement mesons molecules momentum motion moving muon neutrinos neutron Nobel Prize nuclear nucleons nucleus observer orbit oscillators particles photons physicists pions position positrons potential predicted principle Prize for Physics probability problem quantum number quantum theory quarks radiation radius reactions reference frame relativity rotation scattering Schrödinger Schrödinger equation space space-time special relativity spectrum speed of light spin stars symmetry telescope temperature thermal thermodynamics universe velocity violate wavefunction wavelength waves X-rays zero