Bøger af Frank W K Firk

Professor Frank Firk, the son of a baker, was born in the East End of London in the Great Depression. During The War, he was evacuated from the inner city and lived with no fewer than five different foster families. He attended the Coopers' Company's School, founded in 1536 where, in his final year, he was appointed Captain of the School. He was drafted into the Royal Air Force and served for two years as an Air Wireless Mechanic. Although qualified to attend University, he got married and began work at the Atomic Energy Research Establishment, Harwell in southern England. He assisted in carrying out experiments in the field of low-energy neutron spectroscopy, designing apparatus, electronics, and maintaining the Electron Linear Accelerator. He attended the Oxford Polytechnic (essentially an external college of the University of London) one day per week and completed his Physics degree in three years. In 1958 he passed the Graduateship Examination of the Institute of Physics after years of self-study. He then was promoted to the rank of Senior Scientific Officer and was able to carry out independent research. In 1960, he was sent to the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee as a representative of UK Nuclear Physics where he continued to do original work with his American colleagues. After his return to Harwell he set up a new program of research in the field of Nuclear Photodisintegration. This work gained widespread recognition, and resulted in being appointed to the Department of Physics at Yale University. As an external, self-taught student, he obtained the University of London degrees of M. Sc. and Ph. D. He was promoted to a Full Professorship at Yale in 1977. He served in numerous administrative positions during his time at Yale, including the Mastership of Trumbull College in the 1980's. Since retiring in 1999, he has written six papers and published six books. His wife of 62 years taught Yoga to many persons, young and old at Yale, and at recreational centers in local towns. They have three sons and a grandson.

A tale of great ballerinas, government agents, and love found and lost in an instant.

This collection of seven review articles covers experimental and theoretical developments in neutron and photo-nuclear spectroscopy in the Golden Age of classical Nuclear Physics that began with the discovery of the neutron in 1932 and lasted for about 50 years.

For Four decades, research was carried out at the Yale University Electron Accelerator Laboratory. In this historical overview, studies of the interactions of neutrons and photons with nuclei are discussed. Many significant experiments were performed for the first time. 44 PH. D.'s were awarded in the two fields.

The author is Professor Emeritus of Physics at Yale University. Over a period of thirty years, he taught Physics to more than one thousand students including non-science majors and graduate students. These vignettes cover aspects of his lectures that deal with the essential connection between Special Relativity and Quantum Mechanics that is the result of the fundamental concept of particle-wave duality, introduced by deBroglie. It is the tradition to teach these two major branches of Physics as separate subjects so that the connection, emphasized here, is too easily missed.

This book contains review articles by Professor Frank Firk that cover research in the fields of neutron spectroscopy, photo-nuclear interactions, nuclear instrumentation and aspects of number theory dealing with random matrix theory.

Throughout the decade of the 1990's, Professor Firk taught a one-year course of a specialized nature to students who entered Yale College with excellent preparation in Mathematics and the Physical Sciences, and who expressed an interest in Physics or a closely related field. The students were required to take the highest level of introductory Mathematics in parallel with the course. The book covers topics taught in the first semester; they include: 1. MATHEMATICAL PRELIMINARIES 2. KINEMATICS: THE GEOMETRY OF MOTION 3. CLASSICAL AND SPECIAL RELATIVITY 4. NEWTONIAN DYNAMICS 5. INVARIANCE PRINCIPLES AND CONSERVATION LAWS 6. EINSTEINIAN DYNAMICS

This book has its origin in a one-year course for non-science majors that Professor Firk taught at Yale throughout the decade of the 1970's. It is intended for the inquisitive reader who wishes to gain an understanding of the immortal work of Einstein, the greatest scientist since Newton. Special Relativity deals with measurements of space, time and motion in inertial (non-accelerating) frames of reference. A popular account of Einstein's Theory of General Relativity, a theory of space, time, and motion in the presence of gravity, is given. The contents include: 1. Understanding the physical universe 2. Describing everyday motion; relative motion, Newton's Principle of Relativity, problems with light, 3. Einstein's Theory of Special Relativity simultaneity and synchronizing clocks, length contraction and time dilation, examples of Einstein's world, 4. Newtonian and Einsteinian mass 5. Equivalence of energy and mass, E = mc2 6. Principle of Equivalence 7. Einsteinian gravity; gravity and the bending of light, gravity and the flow of time, and red shifts, blue shifts, and black holes.

Six lectures and examples of an exhibit presented to the Fellows of the Henry Koerner Center for Emeritus Faculty at Yale University by Professor Frank Firk are reproduced here. The lectures were given to colleagues who were experts in fields often far removed from Physics and Mathematics; they are therefore suitable for non-specialist, inquisitive readers. The following topics are covered: 1. Understanding Einstein 2. Nuclear Power and Related Issues 3. The Mysterious Primes 4. New Dimensions - a Tribute to Benoit Mandelbrot 5. Perspective and Beyond 6. E = mc2: a neo-Newtonian Approach 7. Some Examples of Drawings and Paintings from an Exhibition.

Group Theory, with its emphasis on Lie Groups and their application to the study of symmetries of the fundamental constituents of matter is introduced at a level suitable for Seniors and advanced Juniors majoring in the Physical Sciences. The book has its origin in a one-semester course that Professor Firk taught at Yale University for more than ten years. It is not generally appreciated by Physicists that continuous transformation groups (Lie Groups) originated in the Theory of Differential Equations. The infinitesimal generators of Lie Groups therefore have forms that involve differential operators and their commutators, and these operators and their algebraic properties have found, and continue to find, a natural place in the development of Quantum Physics. Topics covered include: Galois Groups Algebraic Invariants