Otto Stern

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Otto Stern was also the pen name of German women's rights activist Louise Otto-Peters (1819–1895).

Otto Stern
Carnegie Institute of Technology
University of California, Berkeley
ETH Zurich
Doctoral advisorOtto Sackur

Otto Stern (German pronunciation:

German-American physicist and Nobel laureate in physics. He was the second most nominated physicist for a Nobel Prize, with 82 nominations in the years 1925–1945[1] (most times nominated is Arnold Sommerfeld
with 84 nominations), ultimately winning in 1943.

Biography

Plaque on the wall of what are now the physics institutes of Hamburg University, commemorating Stern's tenure

Stern was born into a Jewish family in Sohrau (now Żory) in the Province of Silesia, the German Empire's Kingdom of Prussia. His father was Oskar Stern (1850–1919), a mill owner, who had been living in Breslau (now Wrocław) since 1892. His mother Eugenia née Rosenthal (1863–1907) was from Rawitsch (now Rawicz) in the Prussian Province of Posen. Otto Stern had a brother, Kurt, who became a noted botanist in Frankfurt, and three sisters. He studied in Freiburg im Breisgau, Munich and Breslau.[2]

Stern completed his studies at the

Charles University in Prague and in 1913 to ETH Zurich. Stern served in World War I doing meteorological work on the Russian front while still continuing his studies and in 1915 received his Habilitation at the University of Frankfurt. In 1921 he became a professor at the University of Rostock which he left in 1923 to become director of the newly founded Institut für Physikalische Chemie at the University of Hamburg
.

In 1930, Stern received an LL.D. degree from

Carnegie Institute of Technology.[5]

As an experimental physicist Stern contributed to the discovery of

molecular beam epitaxy
.

He was awarded the 1943 Nobel Prize in Physics, the first to be awarded since 1939. It was awarded to Stern alone, "for his contribution to the development of the molecular ray method and his discovery of the magnetic moment of the proton" (not for the Stern–Gerlach experiment). The 1943 prize was actually awarded in 1944.[9]]

Stern was elected to the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1945 and the American Philosophical Society in 1946.[10][11]

After Stern retired from the Carnegie Institute of Technology, he moved to

Berkeley. He died of a heart attack in Berkeley on 17 August 1969.[3]

The

Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft
awarded for excellence in experimental physics is named after him and Gerlach.

His niece was the crystallographer Lieselotte Templeton.[12]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "Otto Stern Nominations". nobelprize.org.
  2. ^
    doi:10.1093/anb/9780198606697.article.1301581
    . (subscription required)
  3. ^ a b c "Otto Stern" (PDF). National Academy of Sciences. Retrieved 16 October 2017.
  4. ^ "Otto Stern Biographical". nobelprize.org.
  5. ^ "Pittsburgh Strong: Historic Tribute to a Vibrant Jewish Community".
  6. S2CID 126109346
    .
  7. ^ Friedrich, Bretislav; Herschbach Dudley (December 2003). "Stern and Gerlach: How a Bad Cigar Helped Reorient Atomic Physics". Physics Today. Archived from the original on 29 September 2007. Retrieved 7 October 2007.
  8. S2CID 120812185
    .
  9. ^ "The Nobel Prize in Physics 1943". The Nobel Prize.
  10. ^ "Otto Stern". www.nasonline.org. Retrieved 22 March 2023.
  11. ^ "APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved 22 March 2023.
  12. OCLC 1047864732.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link
    )

Sources

External links

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