A Look At the Life of Nobel Laureate Norman F. Ramsey
The Brookline resident died in Wayland Friday at the age of 96.
When Norman F. Ramsey passed away on Friday, Nov. 4 in Wayland, the 96-year-old physicist was best known for his Nobel Prize-winning work in atomic physics. “My early interest in science was stimulated by reading an article on the quantum theory of the atom. But, at that time I did not realize that physics could be a profession,” Ramsey wrote in his Nobel Prize autobiography. In 1989, he earned the Nobel Prize for work which led to a new way to read the electromagnetic frequencies of atoms, and from that a new standard by which to keep time: the atomic clock. And in 1981, FermiLab named its auditorium for Ramsey, who had helped found the accelerator project there. Ramsey searched for over four decades for what is called the “Neutron …
Michael & Nomi Burstein
8:51 am on Tuesday, November 8, 2011
There's quite a few people living in Brookline who are important and well-known in their fields but who would be unrecognizable if you saw them on the street. As it is, my background is in Physics so I've been aware of Ramsay and his work for a long time. It's sad to see him gone. -- Michael more ›