John Torrence Tate Sr.
John Torrence Tate Sr. (July 28, 1889 – May 27, 1950) was an American physicist noted for his editorship of Physical Review between 1926 and 1950. He is the father of mathematician John Torrence Tate Jr.
John Torrence Tate Sr. | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | John Torrence Tate July 28, 1889 Lenox, Iowa, US |
| Died | May 27, 1950 (aged 60) |
| Alma mater | University of Berlin, University of Nebraska |
| Awards | Presidential Medal for Merit |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Physics |
| Institutions | University of Minnesota, University of Nebraska |
| Doctoral advisor | James Franck |
| Doctoral students | Alfred Otto Carl Nier Walter Brattain |
Biography
Tate was born on 28 July 1889 in Lenox, Iowa. He attended the University of Nebraska, studying electrical engineering, earning a BS in 1910. He continued at the University of Nebraska, shifting his focus to physics and earning an MA in 1912. Like many American students interested in pursuing advanced degrees in physics, he departed for Germany to further his studies, earning a PhD under James Franck in 1914, with a dissertation on "The Heat of Vaporization of Metals." He returned to the University of Nebraska as a faculty member, where he stayed until 1916, when he was offered a post at the University of Minnesota. With the exception of brief sabbaticals to conduct war-related work, Tate remained at Minnesota for the following 34 years. Tate Laboratory of Physics at the University of Minnesota is named in his honor.[1][2]
Editor of Physical Review
While a professor at the University of Minnesota, Tate presided over the growth of the Physical Review into a high impact journal. Physicist John H. Van Vleck, who was a colleague of Tate's at Minnesota from 1923 to 1928, recalled that in the early 20th century "The Physical Review was only so-so, especially in theory, and in 1922 I was greatly pleased that my doctor's thesis was accepted for publication by the Philosophical Magazine in England . . . By 1930 or so, the relative standings of The Physical Review and Philosophical Magazine were interchanged."[3] Alfred Nier and John Van Vleck credited the rapid growth of the journal's size and influence in the 1920s to Tate's sensitivity to the importance of the emerging quantum revolution, and in particular the rapidity with which he published papers relating to quantum phenomena.[2]
Reviewing Einstein and Rosen
On the 1st of June 1936 Tate, as the editor of the Physical Review, received a submission from Albert Einstein and Nathan Rosen. Tate sent the submission to H.P. Robertson, who made an anonymous critical peer review (correctly) questioning the basic conclusion of the paper. On the 23rd of July, Tate returned the submission with the anonymous review. On the 27th of July, Einstein replied:
Dear Sir,
We (Mr. Rosen and I) had sent you our manuscript for publication and had not authorized you to show it to specialists before it is printed. I see no reason to address the—in any case erroneous—comments of your anonymous expert. On the basis of this incident I prefer to publish the paper elsewhere.
Respectfully, ...[4]
References
- American Institute of Physics. "John Tate". Array of Contemporary American Physicists. Retrieved 12 August 2012.
- Nier, Alfred O. C.; Van Vleck, John H. (1975). "John Torrence Tate: 1889–1950". Biographical Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences. Vol. 47. doi:10.17226/570. ISBN 978-0-309-02245-3. Retrieved 12 August 2012.
- Duncan, Anthony; Janssen, Michel (2007). "On the verge of Umdeutung in Minnesota: Van Vleck and the correspondence principle, part one" (PDF). Archive for History of Exact Sciences. 61 (6): 553–624. arXiv:physics/0610192. doi:10.1007/s00407-007-0010-x. S2CID 1783753.
- Kennefick, Daniel (2005). "Einstein Versus the Physical Review". Physics Today. 58 (9): 43–48. Bibcode:2005PhT....58i..43K. doi:10.1063/1.2117822.