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Curiosity for physics and nature of our universe is the fuel for our blog. Normalizing Physics includes discussions about classical physics, quantum physics, astrophysics etc.
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1904 Nobel Prize in Physics
Gold medal of Nobel Prize |
John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh, was a renowned physicist. Rayleigh Scattering, the Rayleigh Jeans Equation, the Refrectometer and the Rayleigh Criterion for Resolution are his contributions to the physics community.
Though as a physicist, Rayleigh used to work with a clear goal in mind but he began working with no clear goal in mind to test Prout's Hypothesis which is the atomic weights of many elements are integral multiples of the atomic weight of hydrogen taken as unity. Rayleigh started by weighing Hydrogen and Oxygen gases to determine their densities. His result for the ratio of the density of Oxygen to Hydrogen was 15.882 which appeared to contradict the weight of 16 for Oxygen. To complete the study then he turned to a seemingly easier problem, weighing Nitrogen. The result was a surprise and also a piece of puzzle. After two years of working he concluded that the density of Nitrogen from chemical origin compared to the density of Nitrogen that obtained from air was always 0.5% less dense. The result was well beyond experimental error and he was unable to explain it. In 1892, he reported about the experiment in the magazine Nature that he was puzzled about the experimental result and asked for a reasonable suggestion to the readers but none was forthcoming.
Constituents of the atmosphere |
Finally William Ramsay, a chemist, learned about Rayleigh's result. He proposed that air might contain a previously unknown heavy gas that wasn't removed. Around this time Rayleigh learned about nearly a hundred yeard old forgotten experiment ran by physicist Henry Cavendish in 1775. Where Cavendish suggested about a non-reactive gaseous constituent of the atmosphere. Rayleigh repeated the experiment and found an unknown gas and also the gas was nonreactive. Meanwhile Ramsay was doing experiment in his way.
Finally, Rayleigh and Ramsay combined their efforts and confirmed the existence of a new inert, monoatomic constituent of the atmosphere. The name of the inert gas is Argon.
Discovery of Argon |
For discovering Argon Rayleigh and Ramsay each received the Nobel Prize in 1904, Rayleigh for physics and Ramsay for Chemistry.
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