Famous Physicists - List of Famous Physicists - page 8
Physicists are the scientists who study the field of physics in great detail. They conduct research into physical phenomena or the natural science that involve the study of matter and related concepts. They analyze the general happenings in nature and try to understand how the universe behaves. On the basis of research through observation and experiments, they discover physical laws and propound theories that explain the functioning of natural forces like gravity, electromagnetism, and nuclear interactions. The discovery of new physical laws and theories contribute to the existing base of theoretical knowledge and can also be used for more practical applications such as development of medial equipment, electronic devices, nuclear reactors, etc. During the earlier days, physics was considered a field of philosophy; it was only during the 19th century that physics was realized as a discipline separate from philosophy. Some of the major branches of physics are classical mechanics, quantum mechanics, theory of relativity and electromagnetism. Since physics covers a vast number of fields, most physicists specialize in one of the many subfields. However, the various subfields may overlap with each other and also with other sciences resulting in interdisciplinary fields such as biophysics, geophysics, meteorology, etc. Browse through this section to explore the biographies, life and works of various famous physicists from all over the world.
The Most Famous Physicists | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Name | Birthday | Nationality | Bio |
| Henry Cavendish | October 10, 1731 | British | Henry Cavendish was a theoretical chemist and physicist, renowned for discovery of hydrogen and calculation of the mass of earth |
| Walter Kohn | March 9, 1923 | Austrian | Nobel Laureate Walter Kohn was an Austrian-born American theoretical chemist and physicist |
| Isaac Newton | January 4, 1643 | British | Isaac Newton was an English scientist and mathematician, who discovered gravitation and Newtonian Mechanics |
| Ernst Ruska | December 25, 1906 | German | Ernst Ruska was a German physicist who invented the electron microscope |
| Amedeo Avogadro | August 9, 1776 | Italian | Amedeo Avogadro was an Italian scientist who formulated what is now known as Avogadro's law |
| Paul Dirac | August 8, 1902 | British | Paul Dirac was an English theoretical physicist known for his contributions to quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics |
| Nikola Tesla | July 10, 1856 | American | Nikola Tesla was a Serbian-American inventor, best known for his development of alternating current electrical systems |
| Franklin Chang Díaz | April 5, 1950 | Chinese, Costa Rican, American | Franklin Chang-Diaz is an American-Costa Rican physicist and former NASA astronaut |
| Richard Feynman | May 11, 1918 | American | Richard Feynman was a Nobel Prize winning American physicist who proposed the theory of quantum electrodynamics |
| J. J. Thomson | December 18, 1856 | British | J.J |
Val Logsdon Fitch
Val Logsdon Fitch was an American nuclear physicist who worked on the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos during the World War II
Henry Way Kendall
Henry Way Kendall (1926–1999) was a leading American physicist
Mark Oliphant
Mark Oliphant was an Australian physicist who played a vital role in the development of nuclear weapons
Charles H. Townes
Charles Hard Townes was an American physicist and inventor
J. Hans D. Jensen
Johannes Hans Daniel Jensen was a German nuclear physicist and a joint winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics
Melvin Schwartz
Melvin Schwartz was an American physicist who played a prominent role in the development of the neutrino beam method
Robert Hofstadter
Robert Hofstadter was an American physicist famous for his research in protons and neutrons
Wolfgang Paul
Wolfgang Paul was a German physicist who shared one-half of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1989
Richard E. Taylor
Richard Edward Taylor is a Canadian scientist who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics for discovering the quarks model
William Alfred Fowler
William Alfred Fowler was an American nuclear physicist and astrophysicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1983,