Gregor Wentzel

Gregor Wentzel (February 17, 1898, in Düsseldorf, Germany – August 12, 1978, in Ascona, Switzerland) was a German physicist known for development of quantum mechanics. Wentzel, Hendrik Kramers, and Léon Brillouin developed the Wentzel–Kramers–Brillouin approximation in 1926.

Career

Wentzel began his university education in mathematics and physics in 1916, at the University of Freiburg. During 1917 and 1918, he served in the armed forces during World War I. He then resumed his education at Freiburg until 1919, when he went to the University of Greifswald. In 1920, he went to the Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich (LMU) to study under Arnold Sommerfeld. Wentzel was awarded his doctorate in 1921 [Dissertation title: "Zur Systematik der Röntgenspekten". Thesis advisor: Arnold Sommerfeld. [http://genealogy.math.ndsu.nodak.edu/html/id.phtml?id=66708 Gregor Wentzel] – The Mathematics Genealogy Project.] and completed his Habilitation in 1922. He remained at LMU as a Privatdozent until he was called to the University of Leipzig in 1926 as an extraordinarius professor of mathematical physics. He became ordinarius professor in the Chair for Theoretical Physics, at the University of Zurich, when he succeeded Erwin Schrödinger, in 1928, the same year Wolfgang Pauli was appointed to the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich. Together, Wentzel and Pauli built the reputation of Zurich as a center for theoretical physics. In 1948, Wentzel took a professorship at the University of Chicago. He retired in 1970 and went to spend his last years in Ascona, Switzerland. In his early years, he contributed to X-ray spectroscopy, but then broadened out to make contributions to quantum mechanics, quantum electrodynamics, and meson theory. [ Mehra, Volume 1, Part 1, 2001, p. 356.] [ [http://www.ethbib.ethz.ch/exhibit/pauli/wentzel.html Wentzel] – ETH Bibliothek] [Jungnickel, Volume 2, 1990, p. 368.]

In 1926, Wentzel, [ Gregor Wentzel "Eine Verallgemeinerun der Quantenbedingungen für die Zwecke der Wellenmechanik", "Z. Physik." 38 518-529 (1926). As cieted in Mehra, 2001, Volume 5, Part 2, p. 961.] Hendrik Kramers, [ H. A. Kramers "Wellenmechanik und halbzahlige Quantisierung", "Z. Physik." 39 828-840 (1926). As cieted in Mehra, 2001, Volume 5, Part 2, p. 920.] and Léon Brillouin [ Léon Brillouin "La mécanique ondulatoire de Schrödinger; une méthode générale de resolution par approximations successives", "Comptes rendus" (Paris) 183 24-26 (1926). As cieted in Mehra, 2001, Volume 5, Part 2, p. 882.] independently developed what became known as the Wentzel–Kramers–Brillouin approximation, also known as the "BWK method", "classical approach", and "phase integral method". [ Schiff, 1968, p. 269.]

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Books

* Gregor Wentzel "Einführung in die Quantentheorie der Wellenfelder" (Franz Deuticke, 1943, 1946) (Ann Arbor, Michigan: J.w. Edwards, 1943, 1946)
**Wentzel, Gregor, translated by Charlotte Houtermans [Charlotte Houtermans nee Riefenstahl, was married to Fritz Houtermans.] and J. M. Jauch, with an Appendix by J. M. Jauch "Quantum Theory of Fields" (Interscience, 1949) (Dover, 2003)

*Gregor Wentzel "Lectures on Strong Coupling Meson Theory at the University of Rochester" (1954)

*Gregor Wentzel and notes by K. K. Gupta "Lectures on Special Topics in Field Theory" (Lectures on Mathematics and Physics: Physics) (Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, 1957)

*Gregor Wentzel "Lectures on Special Topics in Quantum Mechanics" (Lectures on Mathematics and Physics. Physics, 3) (Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, 1965)

Selected Literature

*Arnold Sommerfeld and Gregor Wentzel "Über reguläre und irreguläre Dublett", "Zeitschrift für Physik" 7 86-92 (1921) as cited in [http://www.lrz-muenchen.de/~Sommerfeld/WWW/AS_Bib1.html Sommerfeld Bibliography]

References

*Jungnickel, Christa and Russell McCormmach. "Intellectual Mastery of Nature. Theoretical Physics from Ohm to Einstein, Volume 1: The Torch of Mathematics, 1800 to 1870." University of Chicago Press, paper cover, 1990. ISBN 0-226-41582-1

*Jungnickel, Christa and Russell McCormmach. "Intellectual Mastery of Nature. Theoretical Physics from Ohm to Einstein, Volume 2: The Now Mighty Theoretical Physics, 1870 to 1925." University of Chicago Press, Paper cover, 1990. ISBN 0-226-41585-6

*Mehra, Jagdish, and Helmut Rechenberg "The Historical Development of Quantum Theory. Volume 1 Part 1 The Quantum Theory of Planck, Einstein, Bohr and Sommerfeld 1900 – 1925: Its Foundation and the Rise of Its Difficulties." (Springer, 2001) ISBN 0-387-95174-1

*Mehra, Jagdish, and Helmut Rechenberg "The Historical Development of Quantum Theory. Volume 5 Erwin Schrödinger and the Rise of Wave Mechanics. Part 2 Schrödinger in Vienna and Zurich 1887-1925." (Springer, 2001) ISBN 0-387-95180-6

*Schiff, Leonard I. "Quantum Mechanics" (McGraw-Hill, 3rd edition, 1968)

Bibliography

*P. G. O. Freund and C. J. Goebel and Y. Nambu, Editors "Quanta: Essays in Theoretical Physics Dedicated to Gregor Wentzel" (University of Chicago Press, 70)

External links

* [http://www.ethbib.ethz.ch/exhibit/pauli/wentzel.html Gregror Wentzel] - ETH Bibliothek

* [http://arxiv.org/abs/physics/9704028 "Annales de la Foundation Louis de Broglie"] - "The Third Way to Quantum Mechanics is the Forgotten First"

Notes