Chen Ning Yang
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Chen-Ning Franklin Yang  |
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 Chen-Ning Yang
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| Born | 1 October 1922 Hefei, Anhui, China. |
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| Residence | China |
| Nationality | China, United States |
| Fields | Physics |
| Institutions | Institute for Advanced Study State University of New York at Stony Brook Chinese University of Hong Kong Tsinghua University University of Chicago |
| Alma mater | National Southwestern Associated University Tsinghua |
| Doctoral advisor | Edward Teller |
| Notable awards | Nobel Prize in Physics (1957) Rumford Prize (1980) |
Chen-Ning Franklin Yang (traditional Chinese: 楊振寧; simplified Chinese: 杨振宁; pinyin: Yáng Zhènníng) (born October 1, 1922[1]) is a Chinese-born American physicist who worked on statistical mechanics and symmetry principles.
In 1957, at the age of 35, he and Tsung-Dao Lee received the Nobel Prize in Physics for their theory that weak force interactions between elementary particles did not have parity (mirror-reflection) symmetry. (Chien-Shiung Wu experimentally verified the theory.) Yang's relationship with Lee turned sour around 1962 after they had received the Nobel Prize, unable to agree on which of the two had first proposed the idea of parity non-conservation for weak interaction.
Yang is also well known for his collaboration with Robert Mills in developing a gauge theory of a new class widely known as the Yang-Mills theory. Such "Yang-Mills theories" are now a fundamental part of the Standard Model of particle physics.
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[edit] Biography
Born in Hefei, Anhui, China, Yang attended elementary school in Beijing, and middle school first in Beijing, then in Kunming.
He received his Bachelor of Science degree from National Southwestern Associated University in Kunming in 1942. Two years later, he studied for his Master of Science degree with a full scholarship at Tsinghua University, at the time also in Kunming. He attended the University of Chicago on a Tsinghua University Fellowship in January 1946. There he studied for his Ph.D. with Edward Teller and, after receiving it in 1948, remained for a year as an assistant to Enrico Fermi. In 1949 he moved to the Institute for Advanced Study and in 1965 he became the Albert Einstein Professor of Physics of the State University of New York at Stony Brook and the first director of what is now known as C. N. Yang Institute for Theoretical Physics.
He has been elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society and the Academia Sinica, and was awarded an honorary doctorate by Princeton University (1958).
Yang married Chih-li Tu (traditional Chinese: 杜致禮; pinyin: Dù Zhìlǐ), a teacher, in 1950 and has two sons and a daughter: Franklin Jr., Gilbert, and Eulee (in order of age). His father-in-law was the Kuomintang General Du Yuming.
He retired from Stony Brook in 1999 and returned as honorary director of Tsinghua University, where he is the Huang Jibei - Lu Kaiqun professor at the Center for Advanced Study (CASTU) and teaches first-year physics. His wife died in the winter of 2003. At the age of 82, Yang became engaged to 28-year old Weng Fan (simplified Chinese: 翁帆; pinyin: Wēng Fān), who was studying for her master's degree at Guangdong University of Foreign Studies. They married in early 2005.
[edit] Awards
- Nobel Prize in Physics (1957)
- Rumford Prize (1980)
- National Medal of Science (1986)
- Benjamin Franklin Medal (1993)
- Bower Award (1994)
- Albert Einstein Medal (1995)
- N. Bogoliubov Prize (1996)
- Lars Onsager Prize (1999)
- King Faisal International Prize (2001)
[edit] Notes
- ^ Bing-An Li, Yuefan Deng. Biography of C.N. Yang (PDF). Retrieved on 2007-09-11. “His birth date was erroneously recorded as September 22, 1922 in his 1945 passport. He has used this incorrect date on all subsequent official documents.”
[edit] References
- Yang, C.N. [1952] (1952). Special problems of statistical mechanics. Seattle: University of Washington Press. ASIN B0007FZHH4.
- Yang, C.N. [1961] (1963). Elementary Particles: A Short History of Some Discoveries in Atomic Physics. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ASIN B000E1CBGG.
- Yang, C.N. [1983] (1983). Selected papers 1945-1980, with commentary (Chen Ning Yang). San Francisco: W.H. Freeman. ISBN 071671406X.
- C.N. Yang Institute for Theoretical Physics (YITP). Retrieved on 2008-01-05.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Nobel biography
- YITP website (The C. N. Yang Institute for Theoretical Physics at the State University of New York at Stony Brook)
- Past Faculty biography (Institute for Advanced Study)
- Symmetries and Reflections (C.N. Yang retirement symposium at the State University of New York at Stony Brook)
- Official homepage I (State University of New York at Stony Brook)
- Official homepage II (The Chinese University of Hong Kong)
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| NAME | Yang, Chen Ning Franklin |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | 楊振寧 (Chinese) |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | Nobel Prize-winning physicist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | October 1, 1922 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Hefei, Anhui, China |
| DATE OF DEATH | |
| PLACE OF DEATH | |
