Overview

Julian Schwinger was one of the leading theoretical physicists of the twentieth century. His contributions are as important, and as pervasive, as those of Richard Feynman, with whom (and with Sin-itiro Tomonaga) he shared the 1965 Nobel Prize for Physics. Yet, while Feynman is universally recognized as a cultural icon, Schwinger is little known even to many within the physics community. In his youth, Julian Schwinger was a nuclear physicist, turning to classical electrodynamics after World War II. In the years after the war, he was the first to renormalize quantum electrodynamics. Subsequently, he presented the most complete formulation of quantum field theory and laid the foundations for the electroweak synthesis of Glashow, Weinberg, and Salam, and he made fundamental contributions to the theory of nuclear magnetic resonance, to many-body theory, and to quantum optics. He developed a unique approach to quantum mechanics, measurement algebra, and a general quantum action principle. His discoveries include 'Feynman's' parameters and 'Glauber's' coherent states; in later years he also developed an alternative to operator field theory which he called Source Theory, reflecting his profound phenomenological bent. His late work on the Thomas-Fermi model of atoms and on the Casimir effect continues to be an inspiration to a new generation of physicists. This biography describes the many strands of his research life, while tracing the personal life of this private and gentle genius.

Full Product Details

Author:   Jagdish Mehra ,  Kimball Milton (, Department of Physics, University of Oklahoma)
Publisher:   Oxford University Press
Imprint:   Oxford University Press
Dimensions:   Width: 15.60cm , Height: 3.70cm , Length: 23.40cm
Weight:   1.230kg
ISBN:  

9780198527459

ISBN 10:   0198527454
Pages:   690
Publication Date:   14 August 2003
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Professional and scholarly ,  Undergraduate ,  Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   To order  
Stock availability from the supplier is unknown. We will order it for you and ship this item to you once it is received by us.

Table of Contents

Preface 1: A New York City Childhood 2: Julian Schwinger at Columbia University 3: Schwinger Goes to Berkeley 4: During the Second World War 5: Winding up at the Radiation Lab, Going to Harvard, and Marriage 6: The Development of Quantum Electrodynamics Until 1947: The Historical Background of Julian Schwinger's Work on QED 7: Quantum Electrodynamics and Julian Schwinger's Path to Fame 8: Schwinger, Tomonaga, Feymann, and Dyson: The Triumph of Renormalization 9: Green's Functions and the Dynamical Action Principle 10: The World According to Stern and Gerlach 11: Custodian of Quantum Field Theory 12: Electroweak Unification and Foreshadowing of the Standard Model 13: The Nobel Prize and the Last Years at Harvard 14: Move to UCLA and Continuing Concerns 15: Taking the Road Less Travelled By 16: Diversions of a Gentle Genius Appendix A: Julian Schwinger - List of Publications Appendix B: Ph.D. Students of Julian Schwinger Index

Reviews

Review from previous edition ... a through and comprehensive account of Schwinger's life and work... a valuable testament to the life and legacy of Julian Schwinger Lowell Brown, Physics World ... the first full-length biography of Julian Schwinger ... scholarly and well done. The influence of Julian Schwinger on the physics of his time has been profound. Robert Finkelstein, CERN Courier Mehra and Milton provide a great deal of material from interviews and archival files and thus help give us a fuller picture of Schwinger. Perhaps their most important contribution is their account of the evolution of many of Schwinger's thoughts. [...] It does shed light on a many-faceted genius. Tian Yu Cao, Physics Today

Mehra and Milton provide a great deal of material from interviews and archival files and thus help give us a fuller picture of Schwinger. Perhaps their most important contribution is their account of the evolution of many of Schwinger's thoughts. [...] It does shed light on a many-faceted genius.

Mehra and Milton provide a great deal of material from interviews and archival files and thus help give us a fuller picture of Schwinger. Perhaps their most important contribution is their account of the evolution of many of Schwinger's thoughts. [...] It does shed light on a many-faceted genius. * Tian Yu Cao, Physics Today * ... the first full-length biography of Julian Schwinger ... scholarly and well done. The influence of Julian Schwinger on the physics of his time has been profound. * Robert Finkelstein, CERN Courier * Review from previous edition ... a through and comprehensive account of Schwinger's life and work... a valuable testament to the life and legacy of Julian Schwinger * Lowell Brown, Physics World *

Author Information

Jagdish Mehra has been University Distinguished Professor of Sciences and Humanities at the University of Houston, Texas for many years and also served as UNESCO-Sir Julian Huxley Distinguished Professor of Physics and The History of Science at Trieste and Paris. He has published extensively on the historical and conceptual development of modern physics and is the acclaimed biographer of 'The Beat of a Different Drum: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman'. From Spring 1959 until Schwinger's death, Mehra remained his close friend. Kimball A. Milton is Professor of Physics at the University of Oklahoma, where he leads the theoretical high-energy physics group. He has numerous publications in the field of quantum field theory. He was a student of Julian Schwinger at Harvard and was his postdoctorate associate at UCLA for nearly a decade.

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