 |
| Peter Debye |
Physics is a field dominated by some of the most famous names in
history. One man that had a lot to contribute to the field of physics is
one Peter Debye. He is a Dutch-American physical chemist and physicist
who was also a Nobel Laureate for Chemistry. He was a brilliant man with
lots of interesting projects and theories to share with the world.
His Early Life
Peter Debye was born on 24 March 1884 in Maastricht, Netherlands. His
name was originally Petrus Josephus Wilhelmus Debije but records show
that he eventually changed the name. Peter Debye went to school at
Aachen University of Technology that was located in Rhenish, Prussia. It
was just 30km away from his hometown. In school, he focused on studying
mathematics and classical physics. He got an electrical engineering
degree in 1905 and just 2 years later, in 1907, he published his very
first paper that featured a most elegant solution to be used for solving
problems that concerned eddy currents. While he was studying at Aachen,
he was taught theoretical physics by Arnold Sommerfeld. Arnold
Sommerfeld – who was a theoretical physicist – has stated that it was
actually Peter Debye that he considered as one of his most important
discoveries.
In 1906, Sommerfeld took Debye with him to Munich, Bavaria where he
was given a job. Debye was to be his assistant. It was in 1908 when
Debye obtained his doctorate degree and submitted his dissertation paper
on the subject of radiation pressure. In the year 1910, he used a
method to derive the Planck radiation formula. Mac Planck, who already
had a formula for the same problem agreed that Debye’s formula was a lot
simpler.
The year 1911 saw Debye moving to Switzerland where he would teach at
the University of Zurich. The position opened when Albert Einstein
agreed to take on a job as a professor in Prague. After his stint at the
University of Zurich, he moved to Utrecht in 1912, and then to
Gottingen a year after in 1913. He stayed a bit longer in Gottingen but
in 1920 he moved to ETH Zurich. It took another 7 years for him to make
the move to Leipzig in 1927 and then to Berlin in 1934. Again, he
succeeded Einstein and became the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physics
director. It was during the era of Debye as director that most of the
facilities of the Institute were built. In 1936, Debye was granted the
Lorentz Medal and he became the Deutsche Physikalische Gesselschaft
president from 1937 to 1939.
Contributions to Science
Indeed, he was a man of many talents and visions and this could be
seen in his scientific works. The very first of his many major
scientific contributions was in 1912 when he found a way to use the
dipole moment to the movement of charges in asymmetric molecules. This
was what led him to begin developing equations that related dipole
moments to dielectric and temperature constants. It was because of this
work that the units for molecular dipole moments are called debyes. In
the same year, he went to work to expand on the theory of specific heat
to lower temperatures simply by using low-frequency phonons. The theory
of specific heat was first put forth by Albert Einstein.
A year after he went to work to extend the specific heat theory put
forth by Einstein, he again went to work on the theory of Neils Bohr on
atomic structure. It was this time that he introduced elliptical orbits.
The concept was not something new, though, since his teacher Arnold
Sommerfeld already introduced it before Debye did. From 1914-15, Peter
Debye worked with Paul Scherrer on calculating the effect of varying
temperatures on crystalline solids and the X-ray diffraction patterns
they generated.
In 1923, Debye worked with Erich Huckel, his assistant, to develop
and improve the theory of electrical conductivity in electrolyte
solutions that were put forth by Svante Arrhenius. They did manage to
make some improvements by way of the Debye-Huckel equation and while it
is true that Lars Onsager made further improvements to their equation,
the original equation is still looked upon as a major step towards
gaining a better understanding of solutions that involved electrolytes.
That same year, in 1923, Peter Debye went to work on developing a theory
to help understand the Compton Effect.
His Later Work
Debye worked as a director of physics from 1934 to 39 at the Kiser
Wilhelm Institute in Berlin as the director of physics. From 1936
onwards, he also held a job at the Frederick William Institute of Berlin
as a Theoretical Physics professor. It is important to note that in the
years he held these positions, Hitler was already the ruler of Nazi
Germany and also in Austria.
Debye went to the US and went to Cornell University where he
delivered the Baker Lectures. He left Germany a year later and became a
professor at the same university where he also served as chairman of the
Chemistry department. He held the position for a decade and even became
a member of the Alpha Chi Sigma fraternity. He was granted US
citizenship in 1940 and unlike the Debye of earlier years where he moved
around from position to position, he actually stayed at Cornell for the
rest of his career. In 1952, he retired from the University but that
did not stop him from conducting research until he died.
Personal Life
In some biographies, it was stated that Debye moved to the US because
he refused to accept the citizenship that was foisted on him by the
Nazis. Although some records state that Debye was actively participating
in cleansing the Wilhelm Kaiser Institute of Jewish people and other
non-Aryan people, this truth is still being debated.
Peter Debye got married to Mathilde Alberer in 1913 and they had a
son named Peter P. Debye. They also had a daughter which they named
Mathilde Maria. Peter, their son, became a physicist and worked with his
father on some researches. The younger Peter Debye also had a son who
became a chemist.
