Arthur E. Haas - The Hidden Pioneer of Quantum Mechanics

The book highlights the personal and scientific struggles of Arthur Erich Haas (1884-1941), an Austrian Physicist from a wealthy Jewish middle-class family, whose remarkable accomplishments in a politically hostile but scientifically rewarding environment deserve greater recognition. Haas was a fellow student of both Lise Meitner and Erwin Schrödinger and was also one of the last doctoral students of Ludwig Boltzmann. Following Boltzmann's suicide, Haas was forced to submit a more independent doctoral thesis in which he postulated new approaches in early quantum theory, actually introducing the idea of the Bohr radius before Niels Bohr. It is the lost story of a trailblazer in the fields of quantum mechanics and cosmology, a herald of nuclear energy and applications of modern science.

This biography of Haas is based on new and previously unpublished family records and archived material from the Vienna Academy of Science and the University of Notre Dame, which the author has collected over many years. From his analysis of the letters, documents, and photos that rested for nearly a century in family attics and academic archives, Michael Wiescher provides a unique and detailed insight into the life of a gifted Jewish physicist during the first half of the twentieth century. It also sheds light on the scientific developments and thinking of the time. It appeals not only to historians and physicists, but also general readers. All appreciate the record of Haas' interactions with many of the key figures who helped to found modern physics.

Auteur

Michael Wiescher is Freimann Professor and Director of the Institute for Structure and Nuclear Astrophysics at the University of Notre Dame; he is currently also Adjunct Professor at Michigan State University and Visiting Professor at the University of Surrey and the Goethe University Frankfurt. Wiescher studied history and physics in Münster and received his doctorate in 1980 on a topic in nuclear astrophysics. In the following years until 1986, he was Postdoctoral Fellow at Ohio State University, at the Institute for Nuclear Chemistry in Mainz, and at the Kellogg Radiation Laboratory at CalTech. In 1986, he joined the faculty at the University of Notre Dame and served later as Director of the Nuclear Science Laboratory and the Joint Institute for Nuclear Astrophysics. Over the following decades, Wiescher developed a worldwide research programme in nuclear astrophysics, with research projects in the USA, Brazil, Europe, South Africa, and Japan. Wiescher has also developed a programme in archaeometry, in the analysis of art historical and archaeological materials using atomic and nuclear physics methodology, and is involved in various topics in the history of science. Michael Wiescher is Fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Assoc. for the Advancement of Science and Scientific Member of the Academiae Europaeae. In 2003, he was awarded the Hans Bethe Prize of the DNP & DAP of the American Physical Society and 2018 Laboratory Astrophysics Prize of the American Astronomical Society for his research. He received the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Research Award in 2007 and the Heraeus Award at the University of Frankfurt in 2017.

Résumé

The book highlights the personal and scientific struggles of Arthur Erich Haas (1884-1941), an Austrian Physicist from a wealthy Jewish middle-class family, whose remarkable accomplishments in a politically hostile but scientifically rewarding environment deserve greater recognition. Haas was a fellow student of both Lise Meitner and Erwin Schrödinger and was also one of the last doctoral students of Ludwig Boltzmann. Following Boltzmann's suicide, Haas was forced to submit a more independent doctoral thesis in which he postulated new approaches in early quantum theory, actually introducing the idea of the Bohr radius before Niels Bohr. It is the lost story of a trailblazer in the fields of quantum mechanics and cosmology, a herald of nuclear energy and applications of modern science.

This biography of Haas is based on new and previously unpublished family records and archived material from the Vienna Academy of Science and the University of Notre Dame, which the author has collected over many years. From his analysis of the letters, documents, and photos that rested for nearly a century in family attics and academic archives, Michael Wiescher provides a unique and detailed insight into the life of a gifted Jewish physicist during the first half of the twentieth century. It also sheds light on the scientific developments and thinking of the time. It appeals not only to historians and physicists, but also general readers. All appreciate the record of Haas' interactions with many of the key figures who helped to found modern physics.

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