Master of Modern Physics : : The Scientific Contributions of H. A. Kramers / / D. ter Haar.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Princeton University Press eBook-Package Archive 1927-1999
• VerfasserIn: ter Haar, D.,
• Place / Publishing House: Princeton, NJ : : Princeton University Press, , [2021]; ©1998
• Year of Publication: 2021
• Language: English
• Series: Princeton Series in Physics ; 109
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (296 p.) :; 22 line illus. F024 6x9

The Dutch scientist Hendrik Kramers (1894-1952) was one of the greatest theoretical physicists of the twentieth century--and one of a mere handful who have made major contributions across the whole field. Physicists know his name from, among other things, the Kramers dispersion theory, the Kramers-Heisenberg dispersion formulae, the Kramers opacity formula, the Kramers degeneracy, and the Kramers-Kronig relations. Yet few people know more than the name, or recognize the full depth and range of his contributions. In this book, D. ter Haar seeks to change that. He presents for the first time anywhere a comprehensive discussion of Kramers's scientific work, and reprints twelve of his most important papers. The author shows us that Kramers's remarkable and diverse work makes him at least the equal of such celebrated physicists as Fermi and Landau. He takes us through Kramers's groundbreaking research in such subjects as quantum theory, quantum electrodynamics, statistical mechanics, and solid-state physics. The papers he reprints include Kramers's derivation of the dispersion formulae that led to Heisenberg's matrix mechanics; his classic paper on the Brownian-motion approach to chemical reactions; a pioneering paper on polymers; and a paper on renormalization, a concept first introduced by Kramers and now one of the basic ideas of modern field theory. This book will change how we view the course of twentieth-century science and will show that Kramers was indeed one of the masters of modern physics.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Preface -- 1 Introduction -- 2 The Old Quantum Theory -- 3 Quantum Mechanics -- 4 Quantum Electrodynamics -- 5 Statistical Mechanics, Solid-State Physics, and Low-Temperature Physics -- 6 The Kramers Problem and Polymer Physics -- 7 Miscellaneous Topics -- Reprinted Papers -- A. On the Scattering of Radiation by Atoms -- B. Some Remarks on Heisenberg's Quantum Mechanics -- C. Wave Mechanics and Half-Odd-Integral Quantisation -- D. The Scattering of Light by Atoms -- E. General Theory of Paramagnetic Rotation in Crystals -- F. Classical Relativistic Spin-Theory and Its Quantization -- G. On the Eigenvalue Problem in a One-Dimensional Field of Force -- H. The Use of Charge-Conjugated Wavefunctions in the Hole Theory of the Electron -- I. Brownian Motion in a Field of Force and the Diffusion Model of Chemical Reactions -- J. Statistics of the Two-Dimensional Ferromagnet -- K. Fundamental Difficulties of a Theory of Particles -- L. The Behavior of Macromolecules in Inhomogeneous Flow -- References -- Publications of H. A. Kramers -- Index