Abstract The paper details the life of the Austrian physicist Erwin Rudolf Josef Alexander Schrodinger. It examines his academic career from its origins from the University of Vienna in 1906 to his faculty positions all over the World. It evaluates his work and his published writings on topics such as electromagnetic theory, color theory and wave mechanics and describes his two most famous equations, crucial to relating wave theory with the energy of a system.
From the Paper "With the outbreak of the World War I, despite being stationed on the Italian Front, Schrodingerr published a paper. His first work was based on furthering Boltzmann's ideas. Schrodingerreceived a citation for his efforts in the War. After the war, Schrodinger was sent to Vienna where he continued his research. He published his work on quantum mechanics and later made valuable contributions to the color theory. His work on radioactive decay garnered him an associate faculty's position in Vienna. Financial constraints (having to care for a family?he had recently married) caused Schrodinger to take up a faculty position in Jena. Later he held chairman's positions in Breslau, and finally the chair of theoretical physics at the University of Zurich."
Tags: wave, energy, electromagnetic, theory, color
Abstract This paper discusses the development of quantum mechanics, illustrating its background which began with the classical theory of the atom, continued to Bohr's simple atomic theory, and was developed further with de Broglie's wave theory, Heisenberg's uncertainty principle and Schrodinger's equation. To further investigate the development of quantum mechanics, each of these stages are looked at in more detail, showing the main ideas that each stage added to the understanding of the atom. This paper shows that quantum mechanics is based on the combination of the ideas of many scientists, with the final acceptance of quantum theory occurring when Schrodinger's equation tied together previous theories and allowed them to be applied to subatomic particles.
From the Paper "The classical theory of the atom is based on the model of an atom being made up of a positive nucleus containing protons and neutrons with negatively charged electrons orbiting around this nucleus. This model was first proposed by Rutherford in 1911 who described the atom saying, ?Most of the volume of the atom is empty space in which electrons move around the nucleus.? This basic model of the atom has been expanded on and used to determine how chemicals react with each other, the charges of chemicals and the physical properties of chemicals. While this has involved expanding the theory, the basic understanding of the structure remains the same."
An analysis of how the structure of DNA was discovered by primarily four people; James D. Watson, Francis Crick, Maurice Wilkins and Rosalind Franklin.
Abstract This paper discusses how the structure of DNA was discovered. It goes through the discovery that DNA was the holder of genetic material within a cell to Watson and Crick's infamous model of the structure. The paper includes a heavy emphasis on gender roles in the post World War II science society. The paper also briefly describes the book, "What is Life" written in 1944 by Erwin Schrodinger.
From the Paper "After World War 2, there was a great upsurge in the study of DNA. Scientists, returning home after having been called away to contribute to the war effort (contributions being the use of their skills to create better, more intelligent weapons), arrived home to discover a new idea in the field of genetics. The book, "What is Life" written in 1944 by Erwin SchrA dinger as a collection of lectures, lead many scientists for the first time to really consider the causes and effects of genetic heredity; it became very popular among the university crowd and anyone worth their scientific mettle had read it and had an opinion on the subject of the "code of genetic inheritance". SchrA dinger heavily influenced the people who were later to discover the structure of DNA by making them ask the question, "What causes genetic material to be passed to offspring?" a question which had plagued science ever since man had been capable of intelligent thought."
