Walter Thirring (29 April 1927 – 19 August 2014) was an Austrian physicist after whom the
Thirring model
The Thirring model is an exactly solvable quantum field theory which describes the self-interactions of a Dirac field in (1+1) dimensions.
Definition
The Thirring model is given by the Lagrangian density
:
\mathcal= \overline(i\partial\!\!\!/ ...
in
quantum field theory is named.
He was the son of the physicist
Hans Thirring
Hans Thirring (March 23, 1888 – March 22, 1976) was an Austrian theoretical physicist, professor, and father of the physicist Walter Thirring. He won the Haitinger Prize of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in 1920.
Together with the mathemat ...
.
[Thirring, H. Über die Wirkung rotierender ferner Massen in der Einsteinschen Gravitationstheorie. '']Physikalische Zeitschrift
''Physikalische Zeitschrift'' (English: ''Physical Journal'') was a German scientific journal of physics published from 1899 to 1945 by S. Hirzel Verlag. In 1924, it merged with ''Jahrbuch der Radioaktivität und Elektronik''. From 1944 onwards, ...
'' 19, 33 (1918). (On the Effect of Rotating Distant Masses in Einstein's Theory of Gravitation)[Thirring, H. Berichtigung zu meiner Arbeit: "Über die Wirkung rotierender Massen in der Einsteinschen Gravitationstheorie". ''Physikalische Zeitschrift'' 22, 29 (1921). (Correction to my paper "On the Effect of Rotating Distant Masses in Einstein's Theory of Gravitation")][Lense, J. and Thirring, H. Über den Einfluss der Eigenrotation der Zentralkörper auf die Bewegung der Planeten und Monde nach der Einsteinschen Gravitationstheorie. ''Physikalische Zeitschrift'' 19 156-63 (1918) (On the Influence of the Proper Rotation of Central Bodies on the Motions of Planets and Moons According to Einstein's Theory of Gravitation)]
Life and career
Walter Thirring was born in
Vienna
en, Viennese
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, registration_plate = W
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, timezone_DST ...
,
Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
, where he earned his Doctor of Physics degree in 1949 at the age of 22. In 1959 he became a professor of theoretical physics at the
University of Vienna
The University of Vienna (german: Universität Wien) is a public research university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world. With its long and rich hist ...
, and from 1968 to 1971 he was head of the Theory Division and director at
CERN.
Besides pioneering work in
quantum field theory, Walter Thirring devoted his scientific life to
mathematical physics
Mathematical physics refers to the development of mathematical methods for application to problems in physics. The '' Journal of Mathematical Physics'' defines the field as "the application of mathematics to problems in physics and the developme ...
. He is the author of one of the first textbooks on
quantum electrodynamics
In particle physics, quantum electrodynamics (QED) is the relativistic quantum field theory of electrodynamics. In essence, it describes how light and matter interact and is the first theory where full agreement between quantum mechanics and spec ...
as well as of a four-volume course in
mathematical physics
Mathematical physics refers to the development of mathematical methods for application to problems in physics. The '' Journal of Mathematical Physics'' defines the field as "the application of mathematics to problems in physics and the developme ...
.
[
In 2000, he received the Henri Poincaré Prize of the ]International Association of Mathematical Physics
The International Association of Mathematical Physics (IAMP) was founded in 1976 to promote research in mathematical physics. It brings together research mathematicians and theoretical physicists, including students. The association's ordinary memb ...
.
Walter Thirring authored ''Cosmic Impressions'', Templeton Press, Philadelphia and London, in 2007, and in that book he sums up his feelings about the scientific discoveries made by modern cosmology
Cosmology () is a branch of physics and metaphysics dealing with the nature of the universe. The term ''cosmology'' was first used in English in 1656 in Thomas Blount's ''Glossographia'', and in 1731 taken up in Latin by German philosopher ...
:In the last decades, new worlds have been unveiled that our great teachers wouldn’t have even dreamed of. The panorama of cosmic evolution now enables deep insights into the blueprint of creation… Human beings recognize the blueprints, and understand the language of the Creator… These realizations do not make science the enemy of religion, but glorify the book of Genesis
The Book of Genesis (from Greek ; Hebrew: בְּרֵאשִׁית ''Bəreʾšīt'', "In hebeginning") is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Its Hebrew name is the same as its first word, ( "In the beginning" ...
in the Bible.
His memoirs were published in 2010 as ''The Joy of Discovery: Great Encounters Along the Way'' by World Scientific Publishing Company
World Scientific Publishing is an academic publisher of scientific, technical, and medical books and journals headquartered in Singapore. The company was founded in 1981. It publishes about 600 books annually, along with 135 journals in various ...
. He recollects encounters with scientists like Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...
, Erwin Schrödinger
Erwin Rudolf Josef Alexander Schrödinger (, ; ; 12 August 1887 – 4 January 1961), sometimes written as or , was a Nobel Prize-winning Austrian physicist with Irish citizenship who developed a number of fundamental results in quantum theo ...
, Werner Heisenberg
Werner Karl Heisenberg () (5 December 1901 – 1 February 1976) was a German theoretical physicist and one of the main pioneers of the theory of quantum mechanics. He published his work in 1925 in a breakthrough paper. In the subsequent serie ...
, Wolfgang Pauli
Wolfgang Ernst Pauli (; ; 25 April 1900 – 15 December 1958) was an Austrian theoretical physicist and one of the pioneers of quantum physics. In 1945, after having been nominated by Albert Einstein, Pauli received the Nobel Prize in Physics ...
and others as well as his collaborations with Murray Gell-Mann
Murray Gell-Mann (; September 15, 1929 – May 24, 2019) was an American physicist who received the 1969 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on the theory of elementary particles. He was the Robert Andrews Millikan Professor of Theoretical ...
and Elliott Lieb
Elliott Hershel Lieb (born July 31, 1932) is an American mathematical physicist and professor of mathematics and physics at Princeton University who specializes in statistical mechanics, condensed matter theory, and functional analysis.
Lieb i ...
br>
Honours and awards
* Eötvös Medal (1967)
* Erwin Schrödinger Prize (1969)
* Max Planck Medal
The Max Planck medal is the highest award of the German Physical Society , the world's largest organization of physicists, for extraordinary achievements in theoretical physics. The prize has been awarded annually since 1929, with few exceptions, ...
of the German Physical Society (1978)
* Prize of the city of Vienna (1978)
* Austrian Decoration for Science and Art
The Austrian Decoration for Science and Art (german: Österreichisches Ehrenzeichen für Wissenschaft und Kunst) is a state decoration of the Republic of Austria and forms part of the Austrian national honours system.
History
The "Austrian ...
(1993)
* Honorary Medal of the Austrian capital Vienna in Gold (1993)
* Honorary doctorate from the Comenius University
Comenius University in Bratislava ( sk, Univerzita Komenského v Bratislave) is the largest university in Slovakia, with most of its faculties located in Bratislava. It was founded in 1919, shortly after the creation of Czechoslovakia. It is name ...
in Bratislava (1994)
* Henri Poincaré Prize of IAMP (International Association of Mathematical Physics) 2000
* Member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences
* Member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina
The German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina (german: Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina – Nationale Akademie der Wissenschaften), short Leopoldina, is the national academy of Germany, and is located in Halle (Saale). Founde ...
, Halle
* Member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences
The Pontifical Academy of Sciences ( it, Pontificia accademia delle scienze, la, Pontificia Academia Scientiarum) is a Academy of sciences, scientific academy of the Vatican City, established in 1936 by Pope Pius XI. Its aim is to promote the ...
, Rome
* Member of the National Academy of Sciences, USA
* Member of the Academia Europaea
The Academia Europaea is a pan-European Academy of Humanities, Letters, Law, and Sciences.
The Academia was founded in 1988 as a functioning Europe-wide Academy that encompasses all fields of scholarly inquiry. It acts as co-ordinator of Europea ...
* Member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences
Works
* ''Selected papers of Walter E. Thirring with Commentaries.'' American Mathematical Society, 1998,
* ''Einführung in die Quantenelektrodynamik.'' Deuticke, Wien 1955
** ''Principles of quantum electrodynamics.'' Academic Press, New York 1958; 2nd edn. 1962
* with Ernest M. Henley: ''Elementare Quantenfeldtheorie.'' BI Verlag, Mannheim 1975
* ''Erfolge und Misserfolge der theoretischen Physik''. In: '' Physikalische Blätter'' Jg. 33 (1977), p. 542ff. (Singularitäty theorem of Stephen Hawking and Roger Penrose, KAM-theory, stability of matter, lecture delivered at the presentation of the Max Planck medal)
* ''Lehrbuch der Mathematischen Physik.'' Springer (trans. into English by Evans M. Harrell as ''A course in mathematical physics'')
**1. ''Klassische Dynamische Systeme.'' 1977, ; trans. as ''Classical dynamical systems'' (1978)
**2. ''Klassische Feldtheorie.'' 1978, ; trans. as ''Classical field theory'' (1978)
**3. ''Quantenmechanik von Atomen und Molekülen.'' 1979, ; trans. as ''Quantum mechanics of atoms and molecules'' (1979)
**4. ''Quantenmechanik großer Systeme.'' 1980, ; trans. as ''Quantum mechanics of large systems'' (1983)
*''Stabilität der Materie.'' In: ''Naturwissenschaften.'' Springer, Berlin Jg. 73 (1986), p. 705ff.
* ''Kosmische Impressionen. Gottes Spuren in den Naturgesetzen.'' Molden, Wien 2004,
* ''Einstein entformelt. Wie ein Teenager ihm auf die Schliche kam.'' Seifert Verlag, Wien 2007, co-author Cornelia Faustmann,
* ''Lust am Forschen: Lebensweg und Begegnungen''. Seifert Verlag, Wien 2008,
Notes
References
*
*
* Thirring, Walter, ''Cosmic Impressions: Traces of God in the Laws of Nature'
Templeton Press (May 31, 2007). .
*Emch, Gérard G
"Laudatio"
"Thirring reaches his 80th birthday"
''CERN Courier'' Jul 18, 2007.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thirring, Walter
1927 births
2014 deaths
Austrian Christians
Austrian physicists
Mathematical physicists
Members of the Austrian Academy of Sciences
People associated with CERN
Members of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences
Schrödinger Prize recipients
Foreign associates of the National Academy of Sciences
Recipients of the Austrian Decoration for Science and Art
Members of Academia Europaea
Members of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences
Winners of the Max Planck Medal
Presidents of the International Association of Mathematical Physics