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GP: Fachverband Geschichte der Physik

GP 8: Freie Sektion I

GP 8.3: Talk

Wednesday, March 18, 2015, 12:15–12:45, HL 001

From high energy nuclear physics to high energy physics: the conceptual contribution of nuclear theory to models of elementary particles — •Arianna Borrelli — Technische Universität Berlin

In my contribution I shall present some results from a DFG-funded project on ``The early history of particle physics" and will discuss how notions developed in the 1940s in nuclear physics were employed in and transformed by particle physics of the 1950. Particular attention will be devoted to the concept of ``resonance".

Historical studies have shown how technological and political developments during WW2 shaped post-war experimental particle physics through new techniques and a science policy favouring ``big science". However, theoretical particle physics was no less dependent on this historical constellation well beyond the effect of the flow of new particle phenomena and academic positions. While the role of radar research in shaping post-war quantum field theory has been discussed, less attention has been devoted to how theories of nuclear interactions served as templates to think about and model the new evidence coming in from cosmic rays and accelerator experiments. Indeed, it is no chance that the yearly Rochester conferences, which in the 1950s constituted a main stage for the emergence of particle physics, were initially called conferences on ``High Energy Nuclear Physics".