Robert Eugene Marshak | |
|---|---|
 Marshak in 1939 with a glass of radiosodium he has been drinking from during aradioactive tracer experiment | |
| 8th President of City College of New York | |
| In office 1970–1979 | |
| Preceded by | Buell G. Gallagher |
| Succeeded by | Bernard W. Harleston |
| President of theAmerican Physical Society | |
| In office 1983–1983 | |
| Preceded by | Maurice Goldhaber |
| Succeeded by | Mildred Dresselhaus |
| Personal details | |
| Born | October 11, 1916 |
| Died | December 23, 1992(1992-12-23) (aged 76) |
| Education | Columbia University (BA) Cornell University (PhD) |
Robert Eugene Marshak (October 11, 1916 – December 23, 1992) was an Americanphysicist,educator, and eighth president of theCity College of New York.
Marshak was born in theBronx,New York City. His parents, Harry and Rose Marshak, were immigrants fromMinsk. He went to theCity College of New York for one semester and then "received a Pulitzer Scholarship which provided full tuition and a stipend which allowed him to continue his education atColumbia University."[1][2]
In 1939, Marshak received hisPh.D. fromCornell University. Along with his thesis advisor,Hans Bethe, he discovered many of the fusion aspects involved in star formation. This helped him on his work for theManhattan Project, inLos Alamos, duringWorld War II.[1] During this time, he developed an explanation of how shock waves work in extremely high temperatures achieved by a nuclear explosion, and these waves are known as Marshak waves.[3]
Following the war, Marshak joined theUniversity of Rochester Department of Physics, becoming head of the department in 1950.[4]
In 1947, at theShelter Island Conference, Marshak presented his two-meson hypothesis about thepi-meson, which were discovered shortly thereafter.[5] Three years later, Marshak established the Rochester Conference while chair of the University of Rochester's physics department. This later became known as theInternational Conference on High Energy Physics.[1]
In 1957, Marshak andGeorge Sudarshan proposed a V-A ("vector" minus "axial vector")Lagrangian for weak interactions, which eventually paved the way for the electroweak theory. This theory was later presented byRichard Feynman andMurray Gell-Mann, which later contributed to each winning a Nobel Prize in Physics. Sudarshan stated that Gell-Mann had learned the theory from him at theRochester Conference.[6] Similarly,Richard Feynman learned about the theory from a discussion with Marshak in a conference. Feynman acknowledged Marshak and Sudarshan's contribution in 1963 stating that the V-A theory was discovered by Sudarshan and Marshak and publicized by Gell-Mann and himself.[7]
Marshak was elected to theNational Academy of Sciences in 1958, theAmerican Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1961, and theAmerican Philosophical Society in 1983.[8][9][10]
In 1970, Marshak left Rochester to become president of theCity College of New York.[11] He left to become university distinguished professor at Virginia Tech, retiring in 1991.[1]
Marshak shared the 1982J. Robert Oppenheimer Memorial Prize withMaurice Goldhaber.[12] The next year he served as the president of theAmerican Physical Society, previously having served on its council (1965-1969), as chairman of its Division of Particles and Fields (1969-1970), and as vice-president.[13]
Marshak died by accidental drowning inCancún,Mexico.[1] In addition to Sudarshan, his doctoral students includeSusumu Okubo[citation needed],Rabindra Mohapatra andTullio Regge.[14]
