joseph john thomson He is known as an English physicist who entered the history of science as the character who discovered the electron, his birth was on December 18, 1856, he studied at the University of Cambridge. Learn about Thomson's Biography here!
Life of Joseph John Thomson
the english physicist joseph john thomson He was born in Manchester, he was the son of Joseph James and Emma Thomson, his father worked as a librettist, his dream was for his son to be a great engineer, that's why he sent him to Owens College, what is now known as the University of Manchester, This event occurred at the age of fourteen.
However, two years later, the father died, leaving his son without funds, however, he continued his studies thanks to the financial support of his mother and the scholarship fund. Owens College played an important role in Thomson's career, as he had a superbly equipped faculty and, unlike most universities of the time, taught experimental physics.
After earning his engineering degree from Owens in 1876, JJ Thomson entered the University of Cambridge, studied mathematics and studied the difficulties of theoretical physics, then obtained his bachelor's degree in mathematics in 1880, then was appointed to the academic council of Trinity College and began to deal with the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge.
Starting his new tasks in the laboratory, Thomson decided that the main focus of his research should be the study of the electrical conductivity of gases, he was especially interested in the effects arising from the passage of an electrical discharge between electrodes placed at opposite ends of a glass tube, from which almost all the air is pumped out.
Several researchers, including the English physicist William Crookes, drew attention to a curious phenomenon that occurs in such gas discharge tubes, when the gas becomes sufficiently rarefied, the glass walls of the tube located at the end opposite the cathode ( negative electrode) begin to fluoresce with a greenish light, which, most likely, occurred under the influence of radiation arising at the cathode.
Thomson he died on August 30, 1940, at a difficult time for England, when the threat of an invasion by the Nazis hung over her, he was buried in Westminster Abbey in London.
Works on cathode rays
In the late 1880s, the discussion about the nature of cathode rays took on a sharply controversial character, the Important scientists of the German school were of the opinion that cathode rays are, like light, disturbances of the waves of the invisible ether.
In England, cathode rays were believed to consist of ionized molecules or atoms of the gas itself. Each side had strong evidence in favor of their hypothesis, supporters of the molecular hypothesis correctly pointing out the fact that cathode rays are deflected by a magnetic field, while light rays are not affected by the magnetic field.
Therefore, they are composed of charged particles, on the other hand, the proponents of the corpuscular hypothesis could not explain a number of phenomena. Finally, in 1897, the young English physicist JJ Thomson put an end to these disputes once and for all and at the same time became famous for centuries as the discoverer of the electron.
In his essay, Thomson used a refurbished cathode ray tube, this impressive project was integrated with electric coils that he instituted by adhering to Ampere's law, a magnetic field inside the tube, and an accumulation of similar electric battery plates that established an electric field. inside the tube, this allowed us to study the behavior of cathode rays under the authority of magnetic and electric fields.
Using a newly designed tube, Thomson consistently showed that cathode rays are deflected in a magnetic field in the absence of an electric one.
Cathode rays stray in an electric field at a distance from a magnetic one and with the simultaneous action of electric and magnetic fields of equal momentum, oriented in orientations that specifically cause deviations in opposite directions, cathode rays propagate linearly, that is, the The effect of the two fields balances each other.
Thomson discovered that the relationship between electric and magnetic fields, to which their action is balanced, depends on the speed with which the particles move, after a series of measurements, Thomson was able to determine the speed of cathode rays.
It turned out that they move much more slowly than the speed of light, which implies that cathode rays can only be particles, since any Electromagnetic radiation, including light itself, propagates at the speed of light, these are unknown particles. Thomson called the "corpuscles", but soon they began to be called "electrons".
discovery of isotopes
In 1912, as part of his research on the flow of positively filled particles, referred to as the channel of lightning, Thomson and his scientist Aston managed the flow of neon ions by means of a magnetic and electric field and measured their deviation from placement. of the photographic plate on his way.
They observed two points of light on a photographic plate, which proposed two different parabolic deviations, and concluded that neon consists of atoms of two different atomic masses, that is, two isotopes, this was the first evidence of isotopes of a stable element, Soddite. previously suggested the existence of isotopes to explain the decay of some radioactives.
The separation of Thomson of neon isotopes from their mass was the first example of mass spectrometry, which was later improved and became a general method, using Aston and AJ Dempster.
Other works
- Thomson discovered the natural radioactivity in potassium, this fact occurred specifically in the year 1905.
- He also stated that hydrogen had only one electron per atom, previous hypotheses have legitimized a different number of electrons, this was in the year 1906.
Awards
Thomson At that time he was elected as a member of the Royal Society and was chosen Cavendish Professor of Experimental Physics at the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge University in 1884, it can be said that he has won many distinctions and awards during his career, such as those mentioned below:
- Year 1882: Adams Prize
- Year 1894: Royal Medal
- Year 1902: Hughes Medal
- Year 1902: Hodgkins Medal
- Year 1906: Nobel Prize in Physics
- Year 1910: Elliot Cresson Medal
- Year 1914: Copley Medal
- Year 1922: Franklin Medal
eponymous
There is a lunar crater named Thomson, it is located in the sea of dreams on the opposite side of the moon, only in the northeast there is a rare united alignment of the Van de Graaf crater, on the northwest edge of the mare is O'Day and southwest of Obruchev, on the southern shore of the dream sea.
In the past the crater was flooded with lavas, leaving only the outer rim intact, there are gaps in the eastern and western frames, leaving two "crescents" of rock formations facing each other across a relatively even floor, there is a similar residue of lava-flooded crater attached to the southern end of Thomson. Thomson Paul has a number of secondary influences that form short, linear streaks on the surface.
Thomson Legacy
To a large degree, JJ Thomson who turned atomic physics into a modern science, studies of nuclear organization that continue to this day, and further identification of elementary particles followed his most notable achievement, his discovery of the electron in the year 1897.
Although this new physics has continued to raise more theoretical questions than can be answered today, from the beginning, it quickly gave way to practical applications in technology and industry.
