Hydrogen
Hydrogen is a chemical element with symbol H and atomic number 1. With a standard atomic weight of 1.008, hydrogen is the lightest element in the periodic table. Hydrogen is the most abundant chemical substance in the Universe, constituting 75% of all baryonic mass. Non-remnant stars are composed of hydrogen in the plasma state; the most common isotope of hydrogen, termed protium, has no neutrons. The universal emergence of atomic hydrogen first occurred during the recombination epoch. At standard temperature and pressure, hydrogen is a colorless, tasteless, non-toxic, nonmetallic combustible diatomic gas with the molecular formula H2. Since hydrogen forms covalent compounds with most nonmetallic elements, most of the hydrogen on Earth exists in molecular forms such as water or organic compounds. Hydrogen plays a important role in acid–base reactions because most acid-base reactions involve the exchange of protons between soluble molecules. In ionic compounds, hydrogen can take the form of a negative charge when it is known as a hydride, or as a positively charged species denoted by the symbol H+.
The hydrogen cation is written as though composed of a bare proton, but in reality, hydrogen cations in ionic compounds are always more complex. As the only neutral atom for which the Schrödinger equation can be solved analytically, study of the energetics and bonding of the hydrogen atom has played a key role in the development of quantum mechanics. Hydrogen gas was first artificially produced in the early 16th century by the reaction of acids on metals. In 1766–81, Henry Cavendish was the first to recognize that hydrogen gas was a discrete substance, that it produces water when burned, the property for which it was named: in Greek, hydrogen means "water-former". Industrial production is from steam reforming natural gas, less from more energy-intensive methods such as the electrolysis of water. Most hydrogen is used near the site of its production, the two largest uses being fossil fuel processing and ammonia production for the fertilizer market. Hydrogen is a concern in metallurgy as it can embrittle many metals, complicating the design of pipelines and storage tanks.
Hydrogen gas is flammable and will burn in air at a wide range of concentrations between 4% and 75% by volume. The enthalpy of combustion is −286 kJ/mol: 2 H2 + O2 → 2 H2O + 572 kJ Hydrogen gas forms explosive mixtures with air in concentrations from 4–74% and with chlorine at 5–95%; the explosive reactions may be triggered by heat, or sunlight. The hydrogen autoignition temperature, the temperature of spontaneous ignition in air, is 500 °C. Pure hydrogen-oxygen flames emit ultraviolet light and with high oxygen mix are nearly invisible to the naked eye, as illustrated by the faint plume of the Space Shuttle Main Engine, compared to the visible plume of a Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Booster, which uses an ammonium perchlorate composite; the detection of a burning hydrogen leak may require a flame detector. Hydrogen flames in other conditions are blue; the destruction of the Hindenburg airship was a notorious example of hydrogen combustion and the cause is still debated. The visible orange flames in that incident were the result of a rich mixture of hydrogen to oxygen combined with carbon compounds from the airship skin.
H2 reacts with every oxidizing element. Hydrogen can react spontaneously and violently at room temperature with chlorine and fluorine to form the corresponding hydrogen halides, hydrogen chloride and hydrogen fluoride, which are potentially dangerous acids; the ground state energy level of the electron in a hydrogen atom is −13.6 eV, equivalent to an ultraviolet photon of 91 nm wavelength. The energy levels of hydrogen can be calculated accurately using the Bohr model of the atom, which conceptualizes the electron as "orbiting" the proton in analogy to the Earth's orbit of the Sun. However, the atomic electron and proton are held together by electromagnetic force, while planets and celestial objects are held by gravity; because of the discretization of angular momentum postulated in early quantum mechanics by Bohr, the electron in the Bohr model can only occupy certain allowed distances from the proton, therefore only certain allowed energies. A more accurate description of the hydrogen atom comes from a purely quantum mechanical treatment that uses the Schrödinger equation, Dirac equation or the Feynman path integral formulation to calculate the probability density of the electron around the proton.
The most complicated treatments allow for the small effects of special relativity and vacuum polarization. In the quantum mechanical treatment, the electron in a ground state hydrogen atom has no angular momentum at all—illustrating how the "planetary orbit" differs from electron motion. There exist two different spin isomers of hydrogen diatomic molecules that differ by the relative spin of their nuclei. In the orthohydrogen form, the spins of the two protons are parallel and form a triplet state with a molecular spin quantum number of 1. At standard temperature and pressure, hydrogen gas contains about 25% of the para form and 75% of the ortho form known as the "normal form"; the equilibrium ratio of orthohydrogen to parahydrogen depends on temperature, but because the ortho form is an excited state and has a higher energy
Einstein Prize for Laser Science
The Einstein Prize for Laser Science was a recognition awarded by the former Society for Optical and Quantum Electronics and sponsored by the Eastman Kodak Company. The prize, awarded in the 1988–1999 period, consisted of a 3-inch brass medal including Einstein's image and a depiction of a two-level transition including the A and B coefficients. Recipients of the prize include: Serge Haroche, 1988 Herbert Walther, 1988 H. Jeff Kimble, 1989 Richart E. Slusher, 1989 Carlton M. Caves, 1990 Daniel Frank Walls, 1990 S. E. Harris, 1991 L. M. Narducci, 1991 John L. Hall, 1992 Willis E. Lamb, 1992 Raymond Chiao, 1993 Norman F. Ramsey, 1993 G. S. Agarwal, 1994 Theodor W. Hänsch, 1995 Carl E. Wieman, 1995 David J. Wineland, 1996 Peter L. Knight, 1996 Paul Corkum, 1999In retrospect, the prize was awarded for significant contributions in quantum optics. Two recipients of the Einstein Prize for Laser Science were Nobel laureates in physics and five other recipients went on to win the Nobel Prize in Physics.
Presentation of the prize was done at the Lasers'88 to Lasers'99 conferences. Note: the official name of these conferences was The International Conference on Lasers and Applications, Lasers'XX. Group photograph at Lasers'92 including, right to left, Marlan Scully, Willis Lamb, John L. Hall, F. J. Duarte. Group photograph at Lasers'93 including Norman F. Ramsey, Marlan Scully, F. J. Duarte. Group photograph at Lasers'95 including Marlan Scully, Theodor W. Hänsch, Carl E. Wieman, F. J. Duarte
European Laboratory for Non-Linear Spectroscopy
The European Laboratory for Non-linear Spectroscopy is an interdisciplinary research center established by the Italian Ministry of Education in 1991 within the University of Florence thanks to the initiative of Prof. Salvatore Califano. LENS mission is focused on three main goals: facilitating the scientific collaboration between European researchers in the field of linear and non-linear spectroscopy. LENS has a international and interdisciplinary structure; the Directive Council is composed of experts in the fields of research covered by LENS and oversees all scientific and financial activities: the University of Florence, the Italian National Institute for Optics under the CNR, the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics, the Kaiserslautern University of Technology and the Pierre and Marie Curie University are all represented on the board. Current LENS director, appointed by the Rector of the University of Florence on the proposal of the Directive Council, is Francesco Saverio Pavone; the director shall be assisted by a European Committee composed of the Rectors and Presidents of universities and affiliated research organizations or their representatives.
After many years on the historic hill of Arcetri, since 1995 LENS is located within the Science and Technology Pole at Sesto Fiorentino. LENS foundation is started by a group of researchers involved in atomic and molecular laser spectroscopy, but during two decades its research activity has grown and diversified to cover cold atoms physics, physics of complex and disordered systems, photochemistry and biophysics, quantum biology, materials science, condensed matter physics, the analysis and restoration of artistic heritage. All of these fields share the same fundamental methodology: the use of laser light to investigate matter. LENS research groups are involved in four main research lines: atomic physics, physical chemistry and biophysics; as laser facility, LENS is part of Laserlab-Europe consortium since its foundation, providing access to its labs within the Transnational Access To Research Infrastructures Programme of the European Commission. Main research interests are represented by five Joint Research Activities, two of which involve LENS: ALADIN and OPTBIO.
LENS provides a PhD school supported by the University of Florence and others European universities, a Postdoctoral fellowship programme. Both initiatives are supported by the EU Marie Curie Actions funded by the European Commission in various scientific disciplines and the European Erasmus Mundus programme. In 2006 the Italian CIVR, in its triennial report about national research, has put LENS at the top of Italian small scientific centers for physics and chemistry. European Laboratory for Non-Linear Spectroscopy LaserLab-Europe
Heidelberg University
Heidelberg University is a public research university in Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Founded in 1386 on instruction of Pope Urban VI, Heidelberg is Germany's oldest university and one of the world's oldest surviving universities, it was the third university established in the Holy Roman Empire. Heidelberg has been a coeducational institution since 1899; the university consists of twelve faculties and offers degree programmes at undergraduate and postdoctoral levels in some 100 disciplines. Heidelberg comprises three major campuses: the humanities are predominantly located in Heidelberg's Old Town, the natural sciences and medicine in the Neuenheimer Feld quarter, the social sciences within the inner-city suburb Bergheim; the language of instruction is German, while a considerable number of graduate degrees are offered in English. As of 2017, 56 Nobel Prize winners have been affiliated with the university. Modern scientific psychiatry, psychopharmacology, psychiatric genetics, environmental physics, modern sociology were introduced as scientific disciplines by Heidelberg faculty.
1,000 doctorates are completed every year, with more than one third of the doctoral students coming from abroad. International students from some 130 countries account for more than 20 percent of the entire student body. Internationally renowned and ranked among Europe's top universities, Heidelberg is one of the most prestigious universities in the world, a German Excellence University, part of the U15, as well as a founding member of the League of European Research Universities and the Coimbra Group; the university's noted alumni include eleven domestic and foreign Heads of State or Heads of Government. The Great Schism of 1378 made it possible for Heidelberg, a small city and capital of the Electorate of the Palatinate, to gain its own university; the Great Schism was initiated by the election of two popes after the death of Pope Gregory XI in the same year. One successor the other in Rome; the German secular and spiritual leaders voiced their support for the successor in Rome, which had far-reaching consequences for the German students and teachers in Paris: they lost their stipends and had to leave.
Rupert I recognized the opportunity and initiated talks with the Curia, which led to a Papal Bull for foundation of a university. After having received, on 23 October 1385, permission from pope Urban VI to create a school of general studies, the final decision to found the university was taken on 26 June 1386 at the behest of Rupert I, Count Palatine of the Rhine; as specified in the papal charter, the university was modelled after University of Paris and included four faculties: philosophy, theology and medicine. On 18 October 1386 a special Pontifical High Mass in the Heiliggeistkirche was the ceremony that established the university. On 19 October 1386 the first lecture was held. In November 1386, Marsilius of Inghen was elected first rector of the university; the rector seal motto was semper apertus—i.e. "the book of learning is always open." The university grew and in March 1390, 185 students were enrolled at the university. Between 1414 and 1418, theology and jurisprudence professors of the university took part in the Council of Constance and acted as counselors for Louis III, who attended this council as representative of the emperor and chief magistrate of the realm.
This resulted in establishing a good reputation for its professors. Due to the influence of Marsilius, the university taught the nominalism or via moderna. In 1412, both realism and the teachings of John Wycliffe were forbidden at the university but around 1454, the university decided that realism or via antique would be taught, thus introducing two parallel ways; the transition from scholastic to humanistic culture was effected by the chancellor and bishop Johann von Dalberg in the late 15th century. Humanism was represented at Heidelberg University by the founder of the older German Humanistic School Rudolph Agricola, Conrad Celtes, Jakob Wimpfeling, Johann Reuchlin. Æneas Silvius Piccolomini was chancellor of the university in his capacity of provost of Worms, always favored it with his friendship and good-will as Pope Pius II. In 1482, Pope Sixtus IV permitted laymen and married men to be appointed professors in the ordinary of medicine through a papal dispensation. In 1553, Pope Julius III sanctioned the allotment of ecclesiastical benefice to secular professors.
Martin Luther's disputation at Heidelberg in April 1518 made a lasting impact, his adherents among the masters and scholars soon became leading Reformationists in Southwest Germany. With the Electorate of the Palatinate turn to the Reformed faith, Otto Henry, Elector Palatine, converted the university into a calvinistic institution. In 1563, the Heidelberg Catechism was created under collaboration of members of the university's divinity school; as the 16th century was passing, the late humanism stepped beside Calvinism as a predominant school of thought. It developed into a cultural and academic center. However, with the beginning of the Thirty Years' War in 1618, the intellectual and fiscal wealth of the university declined. In 1622, the then-world-famous Bibliotheca Palatina was stolen from the University Cathedral and taken to Rome; the reconstruction e
Stanford University
Leland Stanford Junior University is a private research university in Stanford, California. Stanford is known for its academic strength, proximity to Silicon Valley, ranking as one of the world's top universities; the university was founded in 1885 by Leland and Jane Stanford in memory of their only child, Leland Stanford Jr. who had died of typhoid fever at age 15 the previous year. Stanford was a U. S. Senator and former Governor of California who made his fortune as a railroad tycoon; the school admitted its first students on October 1, 1891, as a coeducational and non-denominational institution. Stanford University struggled financially after the death of Leland Stanford in 1893 and again after much of the campus was damaged by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Following World War II, Provost Frederick Terman supported faculty and graduates' entrepreneurialism to build self-sufficient local industry in what would be known as Silicon Valley; the university is one of the top fundraising institutions in the country, becoming the first school to raise more than a billion dollars in a year.
The university is organized around three traditional schools consisting of 40 academic departments at the undergraduate and graduate level and four professional schools that focus on graduate programs in Law, Medicine and Business. Stanford's undergraduate program is the most selective in the United States by acceptance rate. Students compete in 36 varsity sports, the university is one of two private institutions in the Division I FBS Pac-12 Conference, it has gained the most for a university. Stanford athletes have won 512 individual championships, Stanford has won the NACDA Directors' Cup for 24 consecutive years, beginning in 1994–1995. In addition, Stanford students and alumni have won 270 Olympic medals including 139 gold medals; as of October 2018, 83 Nobel laureates, 27 Turing Award laureates, 8 Fields Medalists have been affiliated with Stanford as students, faculty or staff. In addition, Stanford University is noted for its entrepreneurship and is one of the most successful universities in attracting funding for start-ups.
Stanford alumni have founded a large number of companies, which combined produce more than $2.7 trillion in annual revenue and have created 5.4 million jobs as of 2011 equivalent to the 10th largest economy in the world. Stanford is the alma mater of 30 living billionaires and 17 astronauts, is one of the leading producers of members of the United States Congress. Stanford University was founded in 1885 by Leland and Jane Stanford, dedicated to Leland Stanford Jr, their only child; the institution opened in 1891 on Stanford's previous Palo Alto farm. Despite being impacted by earthquakes in both 1906 and 1989, the campus was rebuilt each time. In 1919, The Hoover Institution on War and Peace was started by Herbert Hoover to preserve artifacts related to World War I; the Stanford Medical Center, completed in 1959, is a teaching hospital with over 800 beds. The SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, established in 1962, performs research in particle physics. Jane and Leland Stanford modeled their university after the great eastern universities, most Cornell University and Harvard University.
Stanford opened being called the "Cornell of the West" in 1891 due to faculty being former Cornell affiliates including its first president, David Starr Jordan. Both Cornell and Stanford were among the first to have higher education be accessible and open to women as well as to men. Cornell is credited as one of the first American universities to adopt this radical departure from traditional education, Stanford became an early adopter as well. Most of Stanford University is on one of the largest in the United States, it is located on the San Francisco Peninsula, in the northwest part of the Santa Clara Valley 37 miles southeast of San Francisco and 20 miles northwest of San Jose. In 2008, 60% of this land remained undeveloped. Stanford's main campus includes a census-designated place within unincorporated Santa Clara County, although some of the university land is within the city limits of Palo Alto; the campus includes much land in unincorporated San Mateo County, as well as in the city limits of Menlo Park and Portola Valley.
The academic central campus is adjacent to Palo Alto, bounded by El Camino Real, Stanford Avenue, Junipero Serra Boulevard, Sand Hill Road. The United States Postal Service has assigned it two ZIP Codes: 94305 for campus mail and 94309 for P. O. box mail. It lies within area code 650. Stanford operates or intends to operate in various locations outside of its central campus. On the founding grant: Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve is a 1,200-acre natural reserve south of the central campus owned by the university and used by wildlife biologists for research. SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory is a facility west of the central campus operated by the university for the Department of Energy, it contains the longest linear particle accelerator in the world, 2 miles on 426 acres of land. Golf course and a seasonal lake: The university has its own golf course and a seasonal lake, both home to the vulnerable California tiger salamander; as of 2012 Lake Laguni
Max Planck Society
The Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science is a formally independent non-governmental and non-profit association of German research institutes founded in 1911 as the Kaiser Wilhelm Society and renamed the Max Planck Society in 1948 in honor of its former president, theoretical physicist Max Planck. The society is funded by the federal and state governments of Germany. According to its primary goal, the Max Planck Society supports fundamental research in the natural and social sciences, the arts and humanities in its 84 Max Planck Institutes; the society has a total staff of 17,000 permanent employees, including 5,470 scientists, plus around 4,600 non-tenured scientists and guests. The society's budget for 2015 was about €1.7 billion. As of December 31, 2016, the Max Planck Society employed a total of 22,995 staff, of whom 14,036 were scientists, which represents nearly 61 percent of the total number of employees. 44.3% were female employees and 27% of all of the employees were foreign nationals.
The Max Planck Institutes focus on excellence in research. The Max Planck Society has a world-leading reputation as a science and technology research organization, with 33 Nobel Prizes awarded to their scientists, is regarded as one of the foremost basic research organizations in the world. In 2018, the Nature Publishing Index placed the Max Planck institutes third worldwide in terms of research published in Nature journals. In terms of total research volume, the Max Planck Society is only outranked by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Russian Academy of Sciences and Harvard University in the Times Higher Education institutional rankings; the Thomson Reuters-Science Watch website placed the Max Planck Society as the second leading research organization worldwide following Harvard University in terms of the impact of the produced research over science fields. The Max Planck Society and its predecessor Kaiser Wilhelm Society hosted several renowned scientists in their fields, including luminaries such as Otto Hahn, Werner Heisenberg, Albert Einstein.
The organization was established in 1911 as the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, or Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft, a non-governmental research organization named for the German emperor. The KWG was one of the world's leading research organizations. In 1946, Otto Hahn assumed the position of President of KWG, in 1948, the society was renamed the Max Planck Society after its former President Max Planck, who died in 1947; the Max Planck Society has a world-leading reputation as a science and technology research organization. In 2006, the Times Higher Education Supplement rankings of non-university research institutions placed the Max Planck Society as No.1 in the world for science research, No.3 in technology research. The domain mpg.de attracted at least 1.7 million visitors annually by 2008 according to a Compete.com study. Since 2004, the Max Planck Research Award is conferred annually to two internationally renowned scientists, one of whom works in Germany and one in another country. Calls for nominations for the award are invited on an annually rotating basis in specific sub-areas of the natural sciences and engineering, the life sciences and the human and social sciences.
The objective of the Max Planck Society and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in presenting this joint research award is to give added momentum to specialist fields that are either not yet established in Germany or that deserve to be expanded. Adolf von Harnack Max Planck Carl Bosch Albert Vögler Max Planck Otto Hahn Adolf Butenandt Reimar Lüst Heinz Staab Hans F. Zacher Hubert Markl Peter Gruss Martin Stratmann The Max Planck Society is formally an eingetragener Verein, a registered association with the institute directors as scientific members having equal voting rights; the society has its registered seat in Berlin, while the administrative headquarters are located in Munich. Since June 2014, materials scientist Martin Stratmann has been the President of the Max Planck Society. Funding is provided predominantly from federal and state sources, but from research and licence fees and donations. One of the larger donations was the castle Schloss Ringberg near Kreuth in Bavaria, pledged by Luitpold Emanuel in Bayern.
It passed to the Society after the duke died in 1973, is now used for conferences. The Max Planck Society consists of over 80 research institutes. In addition, the society funds a number of Max Planck Research Groups and International Max Planck Research Schools; the purpose of establishing independent research groups at various universities is to strengthen the required networking between universities and institutes of the Max Planck Society. The research units are located across Europe. In 2007 the Society established its first non-European centre, with an institute on the Jupiter campus of Florida Atlantic University focusing on neuroscience; the Max Planck Institutes operate independently from, though in close cooperation with, the universities, focus on innovative research which does not fit into the university structure due to their interdisciplina
Helmholtz-Gymnasium Heidelberg
Helmholtz-Gymnasium Heidelberg is a state-funded gymnasium located on Rohrbacher Straße 102 in Heidelberg, Germany. Founded in 1835, it is now named Helmholtz-Gymnasium after Hermann von Helmholtz, but from 1927 until 1945 it was known as the Philipp Lenard Schule after Philipp Lenard; as of 2018, it had 891 pupils. In addition to its academic curriculum, it is designated by the German Olympic Sports Confederation as an "Eliteschule des Sports"; the school was founded on 23 November 1835 as a "Bürgerschöherehul", a new type of school designed to meet the needs of the merchant class by providing a broad-based education. It was housed in a building, constructed by the Jesuits in 1705 on Kettengasse in the old part of Heidelberg, its first headmaster was a doctor of theology. Over the course of the 19th and early 20th centuries, more courses and year-levels were added until it reached Oberrealschule and Gymnasium status in 1927. Girls were admitted to the school from 1905; the school had no official name until 1937 when it was named Philipp Lenard Schule after the German physicist and Nobel Prize winner Philipp Lenard.
The following year, under Nazi government education reforms, it was converted to an all-boys school. The school was closed during most of World War II. Many of its teachers and older pupils were serving in the army, the school building itself was requisitioned by the German military; when the school reopened in September 1945, Philipp Lenard's name was removed. Lenard had been an active proponent of Nazi ideology; the school's name was changed to Helmholtz-Gymnasium in honour of another German physicist, Hermann von Helmholtz, it once again became co-educational. During the post-war years, the school experienced increasing problems of over-crowding resulting in it having to operate on split sites and provide classes in shifts; the City of Heidelberg earmarked funds for a new school building in 1960. Construction began in 1965, the new building opened on Rohrbacher Straße in 1969; as of 2018, 891 pupils were enrolled in the school. The school teaches the standard Gymnasium curriculum with specialties in sports.
English, French and Latin are taught as well as Turkish to students for whom it is their first language. Designated by the German Ministry of culture as a "Partnerschule für Europa", the school provides bilingual English-German education in biology, geography and social studies for students who have been judged gifted in languages. Since 2003 Helmholtz-Gymnasium has been designated by the German Olympic Sports Confederation as an "Eliteschule des Sports"; the Eliteschule des Sports program is a network of schools which receive extra funding to combine training in competitive sports with education and housing. The program is designed to enable talented young athletes to train at a high level without sacrificing their education; the school's competitive sports program focuses on basketball, rugby, gymnastics and athletics. It has a boarding facility for talented student athletes who come from outside Heidelberg 25 to 30 each year. Helmholtz-Gymnasium has a "Landheim" in the Odenwald countryside near Waldbrunn.
Acquired in the early 1960s and comprising three houses with classrooms, it is used by the school for residential field trips and nature study. Notable alumni of Helmholtz-Gymnasium Heidelberg include: Boris Becker, tennis champion Theodor W. Hänsch, 2005 Nobel prize laureate in physics Hansgünther Heyme, theatre director Albert Speer and Reich Minister of Armaments and War Production for Nazi Germany Official website Website of Helmholtz-Gymnasium's Landheim Media related to Helmholtz-Gymnasium Heidelberg at Wikimedia Commons
