Hendrik Lorentz

Created and claimed by Joe Stapleton

Hendrik Antoon Lorentz was a Nobel Prize Winning, Dutch Physicist who is best known for his theory of electromagnetic radiation. (http://www.famousscientists.org/hendrik-antoon-lorentz/)

Hendrik Lorentz.

Personal Life

Early Life and Education

Hendrik Antoon Lorentz was born in Arnhem, Netherlands, on July 18, 1853. He was the son of nursery-owner Gerrit Frederik Lorentz and wife nee Geertruida van Ginkel. Lorentz was a gifted student. By the time he was 9, he had already mastered the use of the table of logarithms and (http://www.famousscientists.org/hendrik-antoon-lorentz/) in 1866 when the first high school at Arnhem was opened, Lorentz was placed in 3rd form. After Lorentz finished his 5th form and a year of classics study, he entered University of Leyden in 1870 and obtained his Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics and physics in 1871. He then returned to Arnhem in 1872 to become a night-school teacher while also working on his thesis about light diffraction. At the age of 22, Hendrik earned his doctor's degree in 1875 and three years he went on to be appointed to the Chair of Theoretical Physics at Leydon. He remained loyal to his Alma Mater and continued to teach there for the rest of his life. [[Hendrik Antoon Lorentz was a Nobel Prize Winning, Dutch Physicist who is best known for his theory of electromagnetic radiation. Henry married Aletta Catharina Kaiser and together they had three children. Hendrik died on February 4, 1928 from a serious illness. (http://www.famousscientists.org/hendrik-antoon-lorentz/) ]2 ]

Major Contributions

FitzGerald-Lorentz contraction

Also known as the "space contraction", the FitzGerald-Lorentz contraction is the shortening in the length of an object measured by an observer in which the object is traveling at a non-zero velocity. George FitzGerald and Hendrik conceived this idea to explain the negative result of the Michelson-Morley experiment. Their statements implied but never mentioned the idea that electrostatic fields in motion are deformed. Their theory was deemed an ad hoc hypothesis because there was no evidence to support that electromagnetic forces behave in the same way as intermolecular forces. FitzGerald and Lorentz's implications eventually led to the formula:[3]

[math]\displaystyle{ L=\frac{L_{0}}{\gamma(v)}=L_{0}\sqrt{1-v^{2}/c^{2}} }[/math]

where

[math]\displaystyle{ L_{0} }[/math] is the length of the object in its rest frame),

L is the length observed by an observer in relative motion with respect to the object,

v is the relative velocity between the observer and the moving object,

c is the speed of light,

[math]\displaystyle{ {\gamma(v)} }[/math] is the Lorentz factor. This is defined as

[math]\displaystyle{ {\gamma(v)}=\frac1{\sqrt{1-v^{2}/c^{2}}} }[/math]

History

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See also

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Further reading

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External links

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References

This section contains the the references you used while writing this page 1.http://www.famousscientists.org/hendrik-antoon-lorentz/ 2. "Hendrik A. Lorentz - Biographical". Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2014. Web. 1 Dec 2015. <http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1902/lorentz-bio.html> 3.Lorentz, Hendrik Antoon (1892), "The Relative Motion of the Earth and the Aether", Zittingsverlag Akad. V. Wet. 1: 74–79