Timeline: ``Modern'' Physics

450-300 BC Leucippus, Democritos, Epicurus . . . Greek Atomists
335 BC Aristotle continuous elements (earth, air, fire, water)
300 BC Zeno of Cition (founder of Stoics) popularizes Aristotelian view.
60 BC Titus Lucretius Carus of Rome epitomizes ``Atomist'' philosophy.
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1879 Josef Stefan [expt] power emitted as blackbody radiation varies as T4
1884 Ludwig Boltzmann [theor] explains Stefan's empirical law
1885 Johann Jakob Balmer [expt] empirical description of line spectra emitted by H atoms
1890 Johannes Robert Rydberg [expt] line spectra cont'd
1893 Wilhelm Wien [expt] blackbody spectrum displacement law: peak wavelength varies as 1/T
1895 Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen [expt] discovers X-rays
1897 Joseph John Thomson [expt] measures boldmath q/m of the electron
1900 Max Planck [theor] derives correct blackbody radiation spectrum
1902 Philipp E.A. von Lenard [expt] measures photoelectric effect
1905 Albert Einstein [theor] explains photoelectric effect
1905 Albert Einstein [theor] publishes Special Theory of Relativity (STR)
1905 Albert Einstein [theor] explains Brownian motion (gives mass of atoms!)
1905 Ernest Rutherford [expt] performs first alpha-scattering experiments at McGill Univ. (Canada)
1907 Robert A. Milliken [expt] measures electron charge (now know both qe and me).
1912 William (H. & L.) Bragg [expt] shows that X-rays scatter off crystal lattices
1913 Hans Geiger & Ernest Marsden [expt] confirm Rutherford scattering results at Univ. of Manchester (U.K.)
1913 Niels Henrik David Bohr [theor] pictures H atom with quantized angular momentum
1916 Albert Einstein [theor] publishes General Theory of Relativity (GTR)
1916 Robert Andrews Milliken [expt] confirms photoelectric effect in detail
1922 Arthur Holly Compton [expt] scatters X-rays off electrons
1924 Louis Victor de Broglie [theor] hypothesizes ``matter waves'' with   $\lambda = h/p$
1925 Wolfgang Pauli [theor] formulates his exclusion principle
1925 Max Born & Werner Heisenberg [theor] introduce quantum mechanics
1926 Erwin Schroedinger [theor] develops a nonrelativistic wave equation for quantum mechanics
1927 Werner Heisenberg [theor] formulates his uncertainty principle
1928 Paul A.M. Dirac [theor] develops a relativistic wave equation for electrons and predicts antimatter
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Jess H. Brewer
2000-01-23