J.J. Thomson
Sir Joseph John Thomson
Born	December 18, 1856 Manchester, England
Died	August 30, 1940 Cambridge, England

Sir Joseph John Thomson, OM , FRS (December 18, 1756 – August 30, 1940) often known as J. J. Thomson, was an English physicist, the discoverer of the electron. Portrait of J.J. Thomson, from Practical Physics, Millikan and Gale, 1920. ... December 18 is the 352nd day of the year (353rd in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1856 was a leap year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar). ... Manchester is a city in the North West of England. ... Royal motto (French): Dieu et mon droit (Translated: God and my right) Englands location within the UK Official language English de facto Capital London de facto Largest city London Area - Total Ranked 1st UK 130,395 km² Population - Total (mid-2004) - Density Ranked 1st UK 50. ... August 30 is the 242nd day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (243rd in leap years), with 123 days remaining. ... 1940 (MCMXL) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ... Map of the Cambridgeshire area (1904) The city of Cambridge is an old English university town and the administrative centre of the county of Cambridgeshire. ... Royal motto (French): Dieu et mon droit (Translated: God and my right) Englands location within the UK Official language English de facto Capital London de facto Largest city London Area - Total Ranked 1st UK 130,395 km² Population - Total (mid-2004) - Density Ranked 1st UK 50. ... The Order of Merit is a British and Commonwealth Order bestowed by the Monarch. ... The Royal Society of London is claimed to be the oldest learned society still in existence and was founded in 1660. ... December 18 is the 352nd day of the year (353rd in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1756 was a leap year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ... August 30 is the 242nd day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (243rd in leap years), with 123 days remaining. ... 1940 (MCMXL) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ... A physicist is a scientist trained in physics. ... Properties The electron is a fundamental subatomic particle which carries a negative electric charge. ...

Biography

Thomson was born in 1856 near Manchester, North-West England , of Scottish parentage. He studied engineering at Olivias College, Manchester, and moved on to Trinity College, Cambridge. In 1884 he became Cavendish Professor of Physics. In 1890 he married Rose Paget, and he had two children with her. One of his students was Ernest Rutherford, who would later succeed him in the post. 1856 was a leap year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar). ... The Victoria University of Manchester (almost always referred to as simply the University of Manchester) was a university in Manchester in England. ... Full name The College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity Motto Virtus vera nobilitas Virtue is true Nobility Named after The Holy Trinity Previous names Kings Hall and Michaelhouse (until merged in 1546) Established 1546 Sister College Christ Church Master Martin Rees, Baron Rees of Ludlow Location Trinity Street... 1884 is a leap year starting on Tuesday (click on link to calendar). ... The Cavendish Professorship is one of the senior Professorships in Physics at Cambridge University and was founded by grace of 9 February 1871 alongside the famous Cavendish Laboratory which was completed three years later. ... Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson, OM, FRS (August 30, 1871 - October 19, 1937), called father of nuclear physics, pioneered the orbital theory of the atom notably in his discovery of rutherford scattering off the nucleus with his gold foil experiment. ...

Influenced by the work of James Clerk Maxwell, and the discovery of the X-ray, he deduced that cathode rays (produced by Crookes tube) exhibited a single charge-to-mass ratio e/m and must be composed of a single type of negatively charged particle. He called these particles "corpuscles." The term electron had been proposed earlier, by G. Johnstone Stoney, as a fixed quantum of electric charge in electrochemistry, but Thomson realized that it was also a subatomic particle, the first one to be discovered. His discovery was made known in 1897, and caused a sensation in scientific circles, eventually resulting in his being awarded a Nobel prize (1906). In one of the greatest ironies of modern physics his son George Paget Thomson later received the prize for proving that the electron was in fact a wave. (See wave-particle duality) Much of this work was done at the Cavendish Laboratory. James Clerk Maxwell (June 13, 1831–November 5, 1879) was a Scottish mathematical physicist, born in Edinburgh. ... In the NATO phonetic alphabet, X-ray represents the letter X. An X-ray picture (radiograph) taken by Röntgen An X-ray is a form of electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength approximately in the range of 5 pm to 10 nanometers (corresponding to frequencies in the range 30 PHz... Cathode rays are a phenomenon that is observed in vacuum tubes, i. ... The Geissler tube is a glass tube for demonstrating the principles of electrical discharge. ... The charge-to-mass ratio (q/m) of an object is, as its name implies, the charge of an object divided by the mass of the same object. ... Corpuscle is J.J. Thomsons term for a subatomic particle similar to the electron. ... Properties The electron is a fundamental subatomic particle which carries a negative electric charge. ... The word quantum, pl. ... Electric charge is a fundamental conserved property of some subatomic particles, which determines their electromagnetic interactions. ... Electrochemistry is the science of the reactions that can take place at the interface of an electronic conductor (the electrode, which can be a metal or a semiconductor including graphite) and an ionic conductor (the electrolyte). ... A subatomic particle is a particle smaller than an atom: it may be elementary or composite. ... 1897 was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... Hannes Alfvén, 1970 winner for work on astrophysical plasmas List of Nobel Prize laureates in Physics from 1901 to the present day. ... 1906 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... George Paget Thomson (May 3, 1892 – September 10, 1975), British physicist and son of Nobel Prize winning physicist J. J. Thomson. ... In physics, wave-particle duality holds that light and matter can exhibit properties of both waves and of particles. ... Plaque The Cavendish Laboratory is Cambridge Universitys Department of Physics, and is part of the universitys School of Physical Sciences. ...

Thomson's autograph

Thomson's investigations into the action of electrostatic and magnetic fields on the nature of so called "anode rays" or "canal rays" would eventually result in the invention of the mass spectrometer (then called a parabola spectrograph) by Francis Aston, a tool which allows the determination of the mass-to-charge ratio of ions and which has since become an ubiquitous research tool in Chemistry. This is J.J. Thomsons autograph, from Oliver Heaviside: Sage in Solitude (ISBN 0-87942-238-6), p. ... This is J.J. Thomsons autograph, from Oliver Heaviside: Sage in Solitude (ISBN 0-87942-238-6), p. ... Anode rays (or Canal rays) were produced in experiments by a German scientist, Eugen Goldstein, in 1886. ... Mass spectrometry is a technique for separating ions by their mass-to-charge (m/z) ratios. ... Francis William Aston (born Birmingham, September 1, 1877; died Cambridge, November 20, 1945) was a British physicist who won the 1922 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the invention of the mass spectrometer. ...

Prior to the outbreak of World War I, he made another ground-breaking discovery: the isotope. In 1918, he became Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, where he remained till his death. He died in 1940 and was buried in Westminster Abbey, close to Isaac Newton. World War I was primarily a European conflict with many facets: immense human sacrifice, stalemate trench warfare, and the use of new, devastating weapons - tanks, aircraft, machine guns, and poison gas World War I, also known as the First World War, the Great War, the War of the Nations and... Isotopes are forms of an element whose nuclei have the same atomic number–-the number of protons in the nucleus--but different atomic masses because they contain different numbers of neutrons. ... 1918 was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar (see link for calendar) or a common year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar. ... The University of Cambridge is the second-oldest university in the English-speaking world, with one of the most selective sets of entry requirements in the United Kingdom. ... 1940 (MCMXL) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ... The Abbeys western facade The Collegiate Church of St Peter, Westminster, which is almost always referred to as Westminster Abbey, is a mainly Gothic church, on the scale of a cathedral, in Westminster, London, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. ... Sir Isaac Newton, PRS (25 December 1642 (OS) – 20 March 1727 (OS) / 4 January 1643 (NS) – 31 March 1727 (NS)) was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, inventor, philosopher and alchemist. ...

Trivia

Thomson was an esperantist and was the Vice-President of the International Esperanto Science Association. As a recently constructed language, Esperantos history is short and relatively well-known. ...

Further reading

• Dahl, Per F., "Flash of the Cathode Rays: A History of J.J. Thomson's Electron". Institute of Physics Publishing. June, 1997. ISBN 0750304537

External links

• About Joseph John Thomson
• The Discovery of the Electron