Gui Zhiting is one of the founders in the field of geomagnetic and ionospheric research in China. The phenomenon of "extended F layer" was observed, recorded and reported in two hemispheres almost simultaneously with American scientists, which attracted the attention of international geophysicists. Gui Zhiting has been engaged in physics education all his life, and has contributed to the construction of the Physics Department of Wuhan University and the establishment of the Ionospheric Laboratory of Wuhan University. 65438-0956 joined the Jiu San Society and served as the vice chairman of Hubei Branch. In the same year, he was elected as the representative of the Second People's Congress of Wuhan, and was re-elected as the third and fourth representative. 1957 was hired by the Chinese Academy of Sciences as a member of the Academic Committee of the Chinese Physical Society for the International Geophysical Year. His works include geomagnetic and ionospheric radio wave propagation. Wuhan University has Gui Zhiting Scholarship.

Chinese name: Gui Zhiting.

Nationality: China.

Ethnic group: Han nationality

Birthplace: Shashi Town, jiangling county City, Hubei Province (now Shashi City)

Date of birth: 1895 1.9.

Date of death: 196 1

Occupation: physicist, educator

Graduation school: Beijing Tsinghua School

Main achievements: Founder in the field of geomagnetic and ionospheric research.

Representative work: Paper "Characteristics and Spectrum of Low Voltage Arc in Hydrogen, Nitrogen and Hydrogen, Mercury and Nitrogen Mixtures"

The life of the character

life history

Gui Zhiting, born in Qingshan, Wuchang, Hubei Province (now Qingshan District, Wuhan City), 1895 10 was born in a family of Christian clergy in Shashi Town, jiangling county, Hubei Province. My father is the president of Shashi Anglican Church and the principal of the mission primary school. Gui Zhiting was baptized in his early years and his Christian name was Paul. He first went to primary school in Shashi, and then studied at Meihua College in Yichang for four years, which is equivalent to today's high school to junior high school. Because he is the son of a priest, he can enter a church school for free, so 1909 went to Shanghai, studied in St. John's Middle School first, and then entered the university for two years. 19 1 1 year, my father died and my family was in a difficult situation. He wanted to drop out of school and find a job, but his mother thought he was the only son in the family and insisted that he continue to go to school. So I sold some clothes at home and got some help from my sister who was a tutor in Shanghai to avoid dropping out of school.

19 12, Gui Zhiting was admitted to Tsinghua University with the highest score. Because of my good English, I stayed in school as a middle school English teacher for one year after graduation. 19 14 was sent to study in the United States and entered Yale University, where he studied liberal arts first and then transferred to science. 19 17 obtained a bachelor's degree and then entered the university of Chicago for postgraduate study.

At that time, it was the First World War. After the United States entered the war, many physics teachers at the University of Chicago turned to work related to the war, and most of the original research projects could not continue. Gui Zhiting applied to arrive in France in May 19 18 because the YMCA recruited Chinese to serve Chinese workers digging trenches in France. They have more than 60 students from China and the United States applying. They teach China workers to read, write letters and do all kinds of welfare work. After the war, he went to the United States for further study in June 19 19.

He entered Cornell University this time, and studied radio, 1920 master. In Cornell, he met Chinese-American Xu (Ph.D., Columbia University, teaching at Wuhan University). 1920, Gui Zhiting returned home early. The following year, Xu also resolutely gave up American citizenship and came to Shanghai to marry Gui Zhiting. From then on, they began to help each other, encourage each other and devote themselves to the cause of science education in the motherland.

During the period of 1923, Gui Zhiting went to Princeton University in the United States for further study under the support of Rockefeller Foundation scholarship while teaching at Yali University in Changsha. In this school, he studied gas discharge and ultraviolet spectrum with the famous physicist K.T. Compton, and received his doctorate from 1925. His paper "Characteristics and Spectrum of Low Voltage Arc in Hydrogen, Nitrogen and Hydrogen, Mercury and Nitrogen Mixtures" was published in 1925 "American Physical Evaluation".

Gui Zhiting returned to China on 1925. Since then, he has worked in many universities for 37 years: at the age of 32, he was hired as a professor, at the age of 33, he was the head of the Department of Physics, and in the early 1940s, he became a ministerial professor. He has been in charge of the physics department and college of Wuhan University for many years, and was hired as the editor of the international academic journal JowrnalofGeophysicalResearch. He devoted his whole life to the cause of higher education in the motherland and the study of high-altitude atmospheric physics.

character education

1895 1.9 was born in jiangling county, Hubei province.

1911-1912 studied at St. John's University in Shanghai.

1912-1913 studied in Tsinghua University.

1914-1917 studied at Yale university in the United States and obtained a bachelor's degree.

1917 ——1918, graduate student, University of Chicago, USA.

1919-1920 graduate student, master's degree, Cornell university, USA.

1920 ——1922 as an assistant professor of Peking union medical college.

1922 ——1923 Lecturer at Yalong University in Changsha.

1923- 1925 studied as a graduate student at Princeton university in the United States and obtained a doctorate.

1925 ——1927 Associate Professor, Changsha Yali College.

1927 ——1928 used to be a professor at Shenyang northeastern university.

1928 ——1930 Professor, Department of Physics, Shanghai Hujiang University.

1930 ——1939 Professor of Huazhong University in Wuchang, Dean of the School of Science and Head of the Department of Physics.

1939- 196 1, a professor at Wuhan university, was the dean of the school of science and the head of the department of physics.

196 1 year 1 year died in Wuhan.

Main work

1KweiCT (Gui Zhiting). Characteristics and spectra of hydrogen, N2 and mixtures of hydrogen and nitrogen. Physics Review, 1925, 26:535-560.

2 brown FC, kui CT. Geomagnetic observation results in China. Chinese Journal of Physics, 1933,1(1): 91-94.

3KweiCT, TaoSC (Tao Shizhen) Experiment on the fourth electric constant of tung oil. Lingnanjofscience (Journal of Natural Science of Lingnan University), 1933,12: 93-100.

4KweiCT。 Some evidence of dependencies duration of mag-netiedisturbance in the polar latitudes onethurope. TerrMagandAtmElec， 1936，4 1(3):57。

5 Xu Zongyue (Xu Zongyue), Kweict. Journal of China Chemistry, 1936, (4): 105- 106.

6SungPL，KweiCT。 Ionospheric survey in Wuchang Central University, China, 9371October to June 1938. TerrMagandAtmElec,1feb1938,43 (4): 453-461.

7 Guizhi Pavilion. ThestatusofPhysicsinChina . American journal of physics， 1944， 12( 1): 13— 18。

Gui Zhiting, Liang Baixian, Mo Jihua, Zhou Wei. 1The solar eclipse on May 9, 948 and the influence of F-2 layer over Wuchang. Chinese Journal of Physics, 195 1, 8 (3): 195-206.

Gui Zhiting, Wang _. Geomagnetic auroras and ionosphere. Beijing: Science Press, 1957.

10 Gui Zhiting. Influence of Sq current system on ionospheric E layer on magnetic calm days. Journal of Natural Sciences of Wuhan University, 1960, (4): 1-8.

1 1 Gui Zhiting. Geomagnetic and ionospheric radio wave propagation. Wuhan: Wuhan University Press, 1986.

Social assessment

For vocational trainers

Gui Zhiting has been teaching in universities for 40 years and has trained generations of professionals for the country. He has taught general physics, electromagnetism, optics, radio and modern physics. His classes are carefully prepared and his lectures are cordial and vivid. In each class, he first lists the syllabus word by word on the card in Chinese, then prepares the demonstration experiment himself and explains the chart with his assistant.

He treats students affably and has a democratic style. He advocates self-study and encourages in-depth thinking and learning. He announced in class: if anyone feels that the teaching content can't meet the needs, he can quit from behind. At the beginning of the founding of the People's Republic of China, colleges and universities adopted the Soviet syllabus, and the content of basic theory courses was much heavier than before. Some young teachers who came to class recently reported that they had learned little in the past and were unfamiliar with a lot of content, and asked them to make up lessons. He patiently explained to himself that these teachers should study at work and learn in practice. That's what he did himself. Nearly 60 years old, he still takes part in Russian learning, listens to lectures by Soviet experts with his classmates and never misses classes, setting an example for young teachers.

Gui Zhiting is an experimental physicist, and his great achievements in his life are inseparable from experimental observation. He has great affection for the laboratory. Even if he is the head of the department, dean and other positions, teaching and administrative tasks are busy, he often goes to work in the laboratory. Doing it yourself is his pleasure. Behind the desk at home, there is a tool board with a set of commonly used tools neatly placed on it. He pays special attention to the cultivation of experimental skills of his research assistants and students, and personally guides the trial production, installation and debugging of new equipment. In his diary, you can find some records of doing experiments at that time. He once said: "My feelings with some colleagues in the department were established when I was repairing instruments in the laboratory." He often stressed that the use of instruments should not be greedy for novelty, precision and foreign affairs, but should make the best use of everything and learn to choose and use instruments correctly.

He is an expert in geophysics, but encourages students not to follow their own footsteps. When he directed his first graduate student in the 1940s, he pointed out two alternative research directions for students. One is ionospheric physics that I am engaged in research; The other is biophysics. At that time, biophysics was still in its infancy, and he was far-sighted and foresaw its coming vigorous development. In addition, he paid close attention to the problem of whistle propagation in the 1940s. All these prove his foresight in science.

1960, Gui Zhiting began to write the book Geomagnetism and Ionospheric Radio Wave Propagation. Unfortunately, his physical condition was not very good at that time, so he could only finish the first draft in his hospital bed and died soon. His last book was not published by his students until 1985.

Scientific development

China's ancient geomagnetic knowledge is in a leading position in the world, and there are many records in history books. However, China lags behind outsiders in the measurement of geomagnetic constants. Since the late Qing Dynasty, Russians, Japanese, Germans, Americans and French have all conducted geomagnetic surveys in China, but no one in China has presided over this work. 193 1 year, supported by the geomagnetic department of Carnegie Institute, Gui Zhiting made use of school holidays to conduct geomagnetic surveys in North China, South China and West China. To 1935, * * * scored 94 points. The measurement results in North China were published in the Chinese Journal of Physics, Vol. 1,No. 1, 1933. This is the first time that China people have measured geomagnetic constants in their own country.

The variation of geomagnetic field is closely related to the current in the ionosphere. Gui Zhiting considered the plan of ionospheric exploration in China during his short-term study in the Department of Geomagnetism of Carnegie College 1935- 1936. 65438-0936, the Institute of Physics of Chinese Academy of Sciences observed the dependence of ionospheric electron concentration on partial solar eclipse. This is the earliest ionospheric research achievement in China. One of the three observers this time is Liang Baixian, a student of Guizhi Pavilion. Later, Gui Zhiting and his student Song started routine vertical ionospheric sounding in the campus of Huazhong University in Wuchang. At that time, during the period of War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, Wuhan was attacked by air and the working conditions were very difficult. They tried their best to obtain the inspection records from June 1937 to June1938 for 9 months. This is the first time that China has conducted routine observation and research on the ionosphere. This research has achieved two breakthrough results: one is the important phenomenon of "expanding F layer" which was noticed and reported by Gui Zhiting and American scientist H.G.Booker almost at the same time; The other is that Gui Zhiting found that the critical frequency of Wuhan F2 layer obviously exceeded the expected value of latitude distribution. Later, he attributed this phenomenon to "longitude effect", which was actually the ionospheric equatorial anomaly summarized by E.V. appleton and Liang Baixian in 1947.

1943 Gui Zhiting was sent to visit the United States as a famous scholar in China. During his stay in the United States, he helped Wuhan University to study the ionosphere in cooperation with the American Bureau of Standards, and when he returned to China in 1945, he brought back a DTM-CIW3 semi-automatic ionospheric potentiometer with Professor Xu Zongyue. 1946 The official observation began at the wartime campus of Wuhan University in Leshan, Sichuan at 0: 00 on the New Year's Day, and the free layer laboratory of Wuhan University was established.

After War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression's victory, Wuhan University moved back to Wuchang from Leshan. On August 20th, 1946, the free layer laboratory resumed observation in Wuchang. Gui Zhiting led Liang Baixian, Xu Zongyue and other teachers and graduate students in physics and electrical engineering departments to do a lot of observation, analysis and research, and exchanged information and achievements with dozens of observation stations around the world. Since then, a basic team of early ionospheric research in China has taken shape. Under the leadership of Gui Zhiting, in just a few years, the research on the geomagnetic control phenomenon of the critical frequency of F2 layer, the appearance law of F2 layer and the ionospheric effect of solar eclipse in the free layer laboratory was at the forefront of the world at that time. From 65438 to 0949, Gui Zhiting was employed as the editor of JowrnalofGephysicalResearch, an internationally renowned academic journal, and was the first China scholar among the editors of this journal.

After the founding of New China, the ionospheric research initiated by Gui Zhiting of Wuhan University has been developing continuously. 65438-0955, Wuhan University set up the major of ionosphere and radio wave propagation, and resumed enrolling graduate students. 1978 developed into the Department of Space Physics and the Institute of Radio Wave Propagation and Space Physics. In preparation for the International Geophysical Year, Wuhan University cooperated with Institute of Geophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences 1956 to establish a geophysical observatory (now affiliated to Wuhan Institute of Physics, China Academy of Sciences), and Gui Zhiting was employed as a part-time researcher at the Institute of Geophysics. 1960 Wuhan university established Huangpi experimental station. Since then, talented people have come forth in large numbers and achieved fruitful results, all of which are condensed with the painstaking efforts of senior scholars such as Gui Zhiting.

patriotism

Gui Zhiting was born in the devastated China era. His study and work experience, family and social relations are closely related to overseas countries, especially the United States. Throughout his life, he showed patriotism and ambition to serve his country at any time and anywhere.

When he was studying abroad, he abandoned literature to deal with literature in order to "save the country through science". In France, as a citizen of an allied country, he enthusiastically served the workers in China. 19 19, the upsurge of the may 4th movement spread to the United States, and China students from Cornell university held a symposium. Gui Zhiting made a tearful speech at the meeting, saying that it was his duty to save the motherland. Once, a white friend praised his research ability and said that he was "as white as a white man". He immediately claimed that he was "as yellow as a yellow man."

The scientific research he is engaged in has the characteristics of China. Geomagnetic survey and ionospheric research reflect the regional characteristics of China. He used to be engaged in the work of measuring dielectric constant, and also chose tung oil, a specialty exported in China at that time. 1942 at the Sichuan branch of the 10 annual meeting of the Chinese Physical Society held in Chengdu in April, he and his colleagues reported two papers on measuring the dielectric constant of oil and lubricating oil. He studied in missionary schools and abroad for a long time, and seldom came into contact with China's ancient books. However, when I was studying geomagnetism in 1930s, I personally looked through the materials and learned about China's achievements in geomagnetism in ancient times. All these are reflected in his diary and posthumous works.

According to American law, after Xu and Gui Zhiting get married, they will automatically give up their American citizenship, but after certain procedures, they can restore their American citizenship. However, the couple encouraged each other, and no matter what difficulties and setbacks they suffered, they would never waver in their dignity as China people. They are upright and will never change. In the late period of the Liberation War, an American friend wrote to persuade Gui Zhiting to go abroad and found him a job. He declined politely and insisted on staying at home to welcome the birth of the people of China. During the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, Gui Zhiting and his wife insisted that their daughter stay at home and join the army. 1978 Xu went abroad to visit relatives, and despite the retention of 93 relatives from four generations abroad, he resolutely returned to China at the age of 80.

During the period of 19 12- 1949, Gui Zhiting never joined any political groups. Even when the Kuomintang pressured the deans of various colleges to join the Kuomintang, he resolutely refused. However, shortly after the founding of 1956, he joined the Jiu San Society and served as the vice chairman of the Wuhan Municipal Committee of the Society.

Gui Zhiting actively participated in the activities of the Early Physics Society of China. From 1943 to 1945, he served as a director of the Chinese Physical Society (* * * has 12 directors). Before and after that, he also served as the supervisor of Ren Xuehui, the deputy director of the Terminology Review Committee and the member of the Journal Committee.

In order to commemorate this famous physicist who has a certain influence in the world, Wuhan University and the Wuhan Municipal Committee of Jiu San Society held a grand meeting to commemorate his 90th birthday from1October 9 to1October 9 1985. At the same time, the Guizhiting Scholarship of Wuhan University was established and his legacy was published.