Sidney Coleman
Sidney Coleman | |
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Other notable students | Edward Witten[1] |
Sidney Richard Coleman (7 March 1937 – 18 November 2007) was an American theoretical physicist noted for his research in high-energy theoretical physics.
Life and work
Sidney Coleman grew up on the Far North Side of Chicago. In 1957, he received his undergraduate degree from the Illinois Institute of Technology physics department.
Coleman received his Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology in 1962, where he was advised by Murray Gell-Mann. He moved to Harvard University that year, where he spent his entire career, meeting his wife Diana there in the late 1970s. They were married in 1982.
"He was a giant in a peculiar sense, because he's not known to the general populace," Nobel laureate
In 1966,
I first came to Erice in 1966, to lecture at the fourth of the annual schools on subnuclear physics organized by Nino Zichichi. I was charmed by the beauty of Erice, fascinated by the thick layers of Sicilian culture and history, and terrified by the iron rule with which Nino kept the students and faculty in line. In a word, I was won over, and I returned to Erice every year or two thereafter, to talk of what was past, or passing, or to come, at least insofar as it touched on subnuclear theory…These lectures span fourteen years, from 1966 to 1979. This was a great time to be a high-energy theorist, the period of the famous triumph of quantum field theory. And what a triumph it was, in the old sense of the word: a glorious victory parade, full of wonderful things brought back from far places to make the spectator gasp with awe and laugh with joy. I hope some of that awe and joy has been captured here.
Coleman's lectures at
I hate [teaching]. You do it as part of the job. Well, that's of course false ... or maybe more true than false when I say I hate it. ... But I certainly would be just as happy if I had no graduate students. ... Occasionally there is a graduate student who is a joy to collaborate with. Both
David Politzer and Erick Weinberg were of this kind, but they were essentially almost mature physicists. They were very bright by the time they came to me. In general, working with a graduate student is like teaching a course. It's tedious, unpleasant work. A pain in the neck. You do it because you're paid to do it. If I weren't paid to do it I certainly would never do it.[7]
In 1989, Coleman was awarded the
Aside from his academic work, Coleman was a prominent
He died after a long struggle with
Contributions to physics
Some of his best known works are
- Bosonization
- Coleman–Mandula theorem[12]
- Tadpoles
- Coleman theorem[13]
- Equivalence of the Thirring model and the quantum sine-Gordon equation[14]
- Semiclassical analysis of the fate of a false vacuum
- Coleman–Weinberg potential
- Q-balls in the thin-wall limit
- Lectures at Erice, some of which are preserved in his book Aspects of Symmetry[5] (review and teaching)
Famous quotes
- "In order to know the truth, it is necessary to imagine a thousand falsehoods"[15]
- "Quantum gravity is notoriously a subject where problems vastly outnumber results"[16]
Notes
- ^ "Edward Witten – Adventures in physics and math" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-08-23. Retrieved 2016-10-30.
- ^ Sidney Coleman; Harvard icon taught physics classes with wit
- ^ L. Ryder, "Symmetry breaking", J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. 38, 9729 (2005)
- ^ Brading, Katherine and Castellani, Elena, "Symmetry and Symmetry Breaking", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), [1]
- ^ ISBN 0-521-31827-0.
- ISBN 978-981-4635-50-9.
- ^ Sopka, Katherine. "Oral History Transcript - Interview with Dr. Sidney Coleman" American Institute of Physics, Niels Bohr Library & Archives (January 19, 1977)
- ^ "NAS Award for Scientific Reviewing". National Academy of Sciences. Archived from the original on 18 March 2011. Retrieved 27 February 2011.
- ^ "Sidney Coleman Dies at 70"
- ^ ISFDB bibliography
- ^ "Sidney Richard Coleman"
- .
- S2CID 120770166. Archived from the originalon 2007-03-10. Retrieved 2008-04-05.
- S2CID 55746617.
- ^ Socolow, Robert. "Reminiscences of Sidney Coleman" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2019-04-15.
- ISBN 978-981-02-0345-0.
External links
- Oral history interview transcript with Sidney Coleman on 18 January 1977, American Institute of Physics, Niels Bohr Library & Archives
- Sidneyfest - physicists' celebration of Sidney Coleman's life
- Chicago Tribune obituary, November 20, 2007.
- Harvard Gazette obituary, November 29, 2007.
- Boston Globe obituary, January 20, 2008.
- Physics Today obituary, May 2008, written by Sheldon Glashow.
- "Quantum Mechanics In Your Face" Archived 2020-11-12 at the Wayback Machine, A lecture by Prof. Coleman at the New England sectional meeting of the American Physical Society April 9, 1994.
- Physics 253: Quantum Field Theory Archived 2010-08-01 at the Wayback Machine. Video of lectures by Sidney Coleman at Harvard in 1975-1976.
- Sidney Coleman at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
- Sidney Coleman at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- National Academy of Sciences Biographical Memoir[permanent dead link]