Portal:Germany

Born circa 1930–1940

Max Born FRS, FRSE (German pronunciation: [ˈmaks ˈbɔʁn] ^ⓘ; 11 December 1882 – 5 January 1970) was a German-British physicist and mathematician who was instrumental in the development of quantum mechanics. He also made contributions to solid-state physics and optics and supervised the work of a number of notable physicists in the 1920s and 1930s. Born was awarded the 1954 Nobel Prize in Physics for his "fundamental research in quantum mechanics, especially in the statistical interpretation of the wave function".

Born entered the University of Göttingen in 1904, where he met the three renowned mathematicians Felix Klein, David Hilbert, and Hermann Minkowski. He wrote his PhD thesis on the subject of "Stability of Elastica in a Plane and Space", winning the university's Philosophy Faculty Prize. In 1905, he began researching special relativity with Minkowski, and subsequently wrote his habilitation thesis on the Thomson model of the atom. A chance meeting with Fritz Haber in Berlin in 1918 led to discussion of how an ionic compound is formed when a metal reacts with a halogen, which is today known as the Born–Haber cycle.

In World War I, after originally being placed as a radio operator, his specialist knowledge led to him being moved to research duties on sound ranging. In 1921 Born returned to Göttingen, arranging another chair for his long-time friend and colleague James Franck. Under Born Göttingen became one of the world's foremost centres for physics. In 1925 Born and Werner Heisenberg formulated the matrix mechanics representation of quantum mechanics. The following year, he formulated the now-standard interpretation of the probability density function for ψ*ψ in the Schrödinger equation, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1954. His influence extended far beyond his own research. Max Delbrück, Siegfried Flügge, Friedrich Hund, Pascual Jordan, Maria Goeppert-Mayer, Lothar Wolfgang Nordheim, Robert Oppenheimer, and Victor Weisskopf all received their PhD degrees under Born at Göttingen, and his assistants included Enrico Fermi, Werner Heisenberg, Gerhard Herzberg, Friedrich Hund, Pascual Jordan, Wolfgang Pauli, Léon Rosenfeld, Edward Teller, and Eugene Wigner.

In January 1933, the Nazi Party came to power in Germany, and Born, who was Jewish, was suspended from his professorship at the University of Göttingen. He emigrated to the United Kingdom, where he took a job at St John's College, Cambridge, and wrote a popular science book, The Restless Universe, as well as Atomic Physics, which soon became a standard textbook. In October 1936, he became the Tait Professor of Natural Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh, where, working with German-born assistants E. Walter Kellermann and Klaus Fuchs, he continued his research into physics. Born became a naturalised British subject on 31 August 1939, one day before World War II broke out in Europe. He remained in Edinburgh until 1952. He retired to Bad Pyrmont, in West Germany, and died in a hospital in Göttingen on 5 January 1970. (Full article...)

Ferdinand Georg Frobenius

• 1849 – Birth of mathematician Ferdinand Georg Frobenius

• ... that in 2023, a sculpture garden in Praunheim displayed abstract works by Hans Steinbrenner from different periods of his life, and corresponding works by his friends and students?
• ... that German forester Carl A. Schenck founded the first forestry school in North America at George W. Vanderbilt's Biltmore Estate?
• ... that a 15-year-old student was brought to court over throwing an egg during a Gemüseschlacht?
• ... that to include the popular Marian hymn "Maria zu lieben, ist allzeit mein Sinn" in the first common Catholic hymnal in German, Friedrich Dörr retained only its first line?
• ... that when Robert Hale performed as Wagner's Wotan in Washington, a reviewer noted that he commanded "the spirit, from tragic grandeur to ironic detachment, from flooding tenderness to grim rage"?
• ... that the Reichsgesetzblatt was last issued five days before the Battle of Berlin began?
• ... that an album of collectible cards from the German margarine brand Echte Wagner in 1930 presented a vision of the future that incorporated concepts such as wireless personal phones with screens?
• ... that Helene Ollendorff Curth was first to introduce a set of criteria for associating some rashes as possible indicators for internal cancers?

Schweinshaxe served with fried potatoes (Bratkartoffeln) and Sauerkraut at a Bavarian restaurant in Chiang Mai, Thailand

Schweinshaxe (German pronunciation: [ˈʃvaɪns.haksə]), in German cuisine, is a roasted ham hock (or pork knuckle). The ham hock is the end of the pig's leg, just above the ankle and below the meaty ham portion. It is especially popular in Bavaria as Schweinshaxn [ˈʃvaɪns.haksn̩] or Sauhax(n) [ˈsaohaks(n̩)]. A variation of this dish is known in parts of Germany as Eisbein, in which the ham hock is pickled and usually slightly boiled.