1932—Moving into the new physics

Abstract

In 1972 we celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the “annus mirabilis” of nuclear and particle physics. Seen from the perspective of the present, the cluster of major conceptual and technical developments of 1932 mark that “marvelous” year as a very special one. It began with Harold Urey's announcement in January that he had discovered a heavy isotope of hydrogen, which he called “deuterium.” In February James Chadwick demonstrated the existence of a new nuclear constituent, the neutron. In April John Cockcroft and E. T. S. Walton achieved the first disintegration of nuclei by bombarding light elements with artificially accelerated protons. In August Carl Anderson's photographs of cosmic-ray tracks revealed the existence of another new particle, the positively charged electron, soon to be called the “positron.” And later that summer Ernest Lawrence, Stanley Livingston and Milton White disintegrated nuclei with the cyclotron, an instrument that would generate almost 5-million electron volts by the end of that eventful year.

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