101 Quantum Questions: What You Need to Know About the World You Can't See

by Kenneth W. Ford, Paul Hewitt (Illustrator)

Overview

This reader-friendly, richly illustrated book provides an engaging overview of quantum physics, from “big ideas” like probability and uncertainty and conservation laws to the behavior of quarks and photons and neutrinos, and on to explanations of how a laser works and why black holes evaporate.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780674060937
Publisher:	Harvard University Press
Publication date:	07/15/2011
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	304
File size:	10 MB

About the Author

Kenneth W. Ford, retired director of the American Institute of Physics, has taught at university and high-school levels. His books include The Quantum World: Quantum Physics for Everyone and a memoir, In Love with Flying.

Table of Contents

Contents Introduction 1. What is a quantum, anyway? 2. Where do the laws of quantum physics hold sway? 3. What is the correspondence principle? 5. What is inside an atom? 6. Why is solid matter solid if it is mostly empty space? 7. How big is an electron? Is there anything inside it? 8. How big is a nucleus? What is inside it? 9. How big are protons and neutrons? What is inside them? 10. What is Planck's constant and what is its significance? 11. What is a photon? 12. What is the photoelectric effect? 13. What particles are believed to be fundamental? What particles are composite? 14. What is the standard model? 15. What are some quantum scales of distance? 16. How far can one particle "reach out" to influence another one? 17. How fast do particles move? 18. What are some quantum scales of time? 19. What is the meaning of E=mc2? 20. What is electric charge? 21. What is spin? 22. What are some things that are lumpy (and some that are not)? 23. What is a "state of motion"? 24. Is a hydrogen atom in an excited state of motion the same atom in a different state or is it a different atom? 25. What are quantum numbers? What are the rules for combining them? 26. What is a quantum jump? 27. What is the role of probability in quantum physics? 28. Is there any certainty in the quantum world? 29. What is a line spectrum? What does it reveal about atoms? 30. Why is the chart of the elements periodic? 31. Why are heavy atoms nearly the same size as lightweight atoms? 32. How do protons and neutrons move within a nucleus? 33. What are atomic number and atomic mass? 34. Why does the periodic table end? 35. What is radioactivity? What are its forms? 36. Why is the neutron stable within a nucleus but unstable when alone? 37. What is nuclear fission? Why does it release energy? 38. What about nuclear fussion? 39. What is a lepton? What are its flavors? 40. How many distinct neutrinos are there? How do we know? 41. Do neutrinos have mass? Why do they "oscillate"? 42. Are there really only three generations of particles? 43. How do we know that all electrons are identical? 44. Names, names, names. What do they all mean? 45. What are the properties of quarks? How do they combine? 46. What are the composite particles? How many are there? 47. Does every particle have to be a fermion or a boson? What sets these two classes apart? 48. What is a Boss-Einstein condensate? 49. How did bosons and fermions get their names? 50. What is a Feynman diagram? 51. What are the essential features of Feynman diagrams? 52. How do Feynman diagrams illustrate the strong, weak, and electromagnetic interactions? 53. Which particles are stable? Which are unstable? What does it mean to say that a particle decays? 54. What is scattering? 55. What is the same before and after a scattering or a decay? 56. What changes during a scattering or decay? 57. What are the "big four" absolute conservation laws? 58. What additional absolute conservation laws operate in the quantum world? 59. What is the TCP theorem? 60. What conservation laws are only "partial"? 61. What symmetry principles are only "partial"? 62. What are laws of compulsion and of prohibition? 63. How are the concepts of symmetry, invariance, and conservation related? 64. What do waves and particles have in common? How do they differ? 65. What is the de Broglie equation? What is its significance? 66. How are waves related to quantum lumps? 67. How do waves relate to the size of atoms? 68. What is diffraction? What is interference? 69. What is the two-slit experiment? Why is it important? 70. What is tunneling? 71. What is a wave function? What is Schrödinger’s equation? 72. How do waves determine probabilities? 73. How do waves prevent particles from having fixed positions? 74. What is the uncertainty principle? 75. How does the uncertainty principle relate to the wave nature of matter? 76. What is superposition? 77. Are waves necessary? 78. How are particles pushed close to the speed of light? 79. How are high-energy particles detected? 80. How does a laser work? 81. How do electrons behave in a metal? 82. What is a semiconductor? 83. What is a p-n junction? Why is it a diode? 84. What are some uses of diodes? 85. What is a transitor? 86. Why do black holes evaporate? 87. How does quantum physics operate in the center of the Sun? 88. What is superconductivity? 89. What is superfluidity? 90. What is a Josephson junction? 91. What is a quantum dot? 92. What is quark-gluon plasma? 93. What is the Planck length? What is quantum foam? 94. Why are physicists in love with the number 137? 95. What is entanglement? 96. What is Bell's inequality? 97. What is a qubit? What is quantum computing? 98. What is the Higgs particle? Why is it important? 99. What is string theory? 100. What is the "measurement problem"? 101. How come the quantum? Appendix A Appendix B Acknowledgments Index

Editorial Reviews

Kenneth Ford's question-and-answer-style guide to the weirdness of the quantum realm is a clear and handy reference. Ford's easy-going prose will help you feel right at home at nature's tiniest and most counterintuitive scale.
— Amanda Gefter

New Scientist

This work provides the means for a lay reader to gain a basic understanding of much of the technical language and jargon that filters into popular accounts of quantum physics.
— D. B. Moss

Choice

This work provides the means for a lay reader to gain a basic understanding of much of the technical language and jargon that filters into popular accounts of quantum physics.

Choice - D. B. Moss

Kenneth Ford's question-and-answer-style guide to the weirdness of the quantum realm is a clear and handy reference. Ford's easy-going prose will help you feel right at home at nature's tiniest and most counterintuitive scale.

New Scientist - Amanda Gefter

Among the slew of books published in the last several decades aiming to explain modern physics to the public, this work is surely one of the best.--Jack W. Weigel "Library Journal (starred review)" (3/15/2011 12:00:00 AM)

In this entertaining and comprehensive overview, Ford, former director of the American Institute of Physics, manages to encapsulate modern physics while illuminating rather than befuddling the lay reader...By using humor and straight talk to answer questions that often bedevil the non-scientist who attempts to grasp this knotty subject, Ford has created an entertaining read and an excellent companion piece to more detailed popular treatments of modern physics.-- "Publishers Weekly (starred review)" (2/7/2011 12:00:00 AM)

Kenneth Ford's question-and-answer-style guide to the weirdness of the quantum realm is a clear and handy reference. Ford's easy-going prose will help you feel right at home at nature's tiniest and most counterintuitive scale.--Amanda Gefter "New Scientist" (3/12/2011 12:00:00 AM)

This work provides the means for a lay reader to gain a basic understanding of much of the technical language and jargon that filters into popular accounts of quantum physics.--D. B. Moss "Choice" (9/1/2011 12:00:00 AM)

From the Publisher

The physics of the subatomic world is very different from the classical physics that explains the visible world. Physicist Ford's guide is presented in Q&A format and can be read as a reference or for pleasure. (LJ 3/15/11)

Library Journal