The bubble chamber, invented by Donald Glaser at the University of Michigan in 1952, let physicists photograph particle trajectories as strings of bubbles in a superheated liquid; Glaser won the 1960 Nobel Prize in physics for it. Luis Alvarez at Berkeley then scaled the device up and paired it with computer algorithms to identify particle resonance states, establishing the detector-plus-computer-analysis approach still used at CERN and Fermilab, earning him the 1968 Nobel Prize in physics. Separately, Paul Flory at Cornell laid out the theoretical foundations of polymer physical chemistry in 1953, explaining how large molecules built from repeating monomer units, like proteins and carbohydrates, behave, work that won him the 1974 Nobel Prize in chemistry.
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Alvarez's method of running particle collision data through computer algorithms to find resonance states became the standard workflow for modern particle physics experiments.
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One host mentions writing an undergraduate physics paper on Flory's polymer theory, describing it as a personal full-circle moment.
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1:26:231952 invention and scaling of the bubble chamber. >> Yeah, this was huge for particle physics. Um Donald Glasser invented the bubble chamber in University of Michigan. He won the 1960 Nobel Prize in physics. And then Luis Alvarez, another um person that we've talked about in the Oppenheimer episode. Luis Alvarez at California University in Berkeley. He was like, I'm going to make it bigger and I'm going to take all of these particle collisions that are happening inside my bubble chamber and I'm going to run it through computer algorithms to find out resonance states. He won the 1968 Nobel Prize in physics. And he really established this modern idea of particle physics where I have a bunch of detectors. Those detectors register
1:27:04particle trajectories and then I have computer algorithms that tell me what is going on inside. This is how CERN works. This is how Fermy Lab works. And this is how almost every scientific endeavor works. Now, >> I promise CERN turning off until 2030 is not making time go longer, which is all of what's being talked about on social media right now. 1953, Foundations of Polymer Physical Chemistry. Yes. Um Paul Flory at the Cornell University in Ithaca, he provided the theoretical framework for principles of polymer chemistry. Polymers meaning um large chemicals that are made up of monomers,
1:27:45little little building blocks like proteins, like carbohydrates. Um this is special for me because um at Princeton during my undergrad, one of the junior papers that I had to write as part of the physics department program was on polymer physics. >> JP was on polymer. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I remember reading his papers um uh you know flority theory and things like that and now it's coming back full circle. So he won the 1974 Nobel Prize in chemistry. >> Amazing. I'm just realizing now my hat and glasses combo look just like that cult classic movie where they're in a convertible and they're driving and I can't remember what the movie is. So if
1:28:25you can remember what that movie is, comment below. You know what I'm talking about. I can't remember either though. >> But I can't remember comments. Come on. >> Uh 1953 invention of the Master and the Laser. >> Yes, this is the laser. >> Laser. >> Okay. So um Charles Towns invents the Maser which is the microwave ampl amplification from stimulated emission of radiation. So he made a laser but in the microwaves and then he got the Nobel Prize in 1964 for inventing the mer. Um