Paul BaldufThe #paperOfTheDay is Wolfgang Pauli's letter to experimental physicists Lise Meitner and Hans Geiger in December 1930. Pauli explains that he is unable to join their meeting due to a ball event in Zürich, but still wants to inform them about his newest theory.
At that time, beta decay had been well confirmed experimentally, but the energies and momenta of the observed particles did not add up. This had puzzled physicists to a degree such that Debye, quoted by Pauli, said "Oh, better don't think about this at all, like about new taxes!".
Pauli now proposes that there actually is a new type of particle that has so far escaped observation, which he calls "neutron". He makes some brief comments on the mass and interaction of such a particle. He will as of now not officially publish these since it is pure speculation and there is currently no experimental evidence for this particle. Instead, he has written this letter to the experimental physicists, which ends "Also, liebe Radioaktive, prüfet und richtet!" -- "Hence, dear radioactive [ladies and gentlemen], scrutinize and judge!"
A few years later, Fermi developed a full theory for Pauli's particle, and renamed it into "neutrino". The direct experimental confirmation of the #neutrino is tricky, and would take another several years. Conversely, the nuclear constituent particle we now know as "neutron", was experimentally observed already in 1932. #physics #radioactive
German letter: https://cds.cern.ch/record/83282/files/meitner
English translation: https://radioactivity.eu.com/articles/phenomenon/paulis-letter
At that time, beta decay had been well confirmed experimentally, but the energies and momenta of the observed particles did not add up. This had puzzled physicists to a degree such that Debye, quoted by Pauli, said "Oh, better don't think about this at all, like about new taxes!".
Pauli now proposes that there actually is a new type of particle that has so far escaped observation, which he calls "neutron". He makes some brief comments on the mass and interaction of such a particle. He will as of now not officially publish these since it is pure speculation and there is currently no experimental evidence for this particle. Instead, he has written this letter to the experimental physicists, which ends "Also, liebe Radioaktive, prüfet und richtet!" -- "Hence, dear radioactive [ladies and gentlemen], scrutinize and judge!"
A few years later, Fermi developed a full theory for Pauli's particle, and renamed it into "neutrino". The direct experimental confirmation of the #neutrino is tricky, and would take another several years. Conversely, the nuclear constituent particle we now know as "neutron", was experimentally observed already in 1932. #physics #radioactive
German letter: https://cds.cern.ch/record/83282/files/meitner
English translation: https://radioactivity.eu.com/articles/phenomenon/paulis-letter
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