Ding Zhaozhong's ancestral home is Rizhao County; 1936 was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA; His father is Ding and his mother is Wang Juanying. He studied in a middle school in Taipei, studied undergraduate and graduate students at the University of Michigan, and received his doctorate from 1962. I have been teaching at MIT since 1967. Professor Ding has made many outstanding contributions to particle physics. The most famous one is that 1974 discovered the J particle, which led the new direction of particle physics, and 1976 won the Nobel Prize in physics. In addition, his research on the accuracy of quantum electrodynamics, the properties of leptons, the properties of vector particles, the phenomenon of gluon injection and the interference of Z-γ are all very important contributions. In recent years, Professor Ding set up and led the experimental group to actively build L3 detector, which will be tested on the LEP accelerator of CERN from 1988. This is a great plan, which has mobilized more than 400 experimental physicists around the world, and the construction cost of the detector will exceed 1 100 million US dollars. Professor Ding is one of the most outstanding contemporary experimental physicists. His work is characterized by clear and decisive direction and careful planning.
award-winning work
A new kind of heavy elementary particle, J/ψ particle (now called J particle), was discovered.
China's voice resounded through the Nobel Prize Hall. He was the first winner to speak in Chinese at the Nobel Prize ceremony. As an experimental physicist, he discovered the J particle. This discovery is praised as an important milestone in the history of physics development by the international high-energy physics community.
1974165438+1October 10 is an unusual Sunday. On this day, a team led by Professor Ding Zhaozhong, a Chinese-American physicist, discovered a new elementary particle at the National Bruhaven Laboratory in Uppsala, New York, USA.
Although people have been discovering new elementary particles in recent years, the new particles discovered in Ding Zhaozhong this time are very unique. It is uncharged, and its lifetime is 1000 times longer than that of new particles discovered in recent years-although it is extremely "short-lived" in the eyes of ordinary people, and it can only live for 0.000000000006+0 seconds.
This is a new kind of heavy photon, which Ding Zhaozhong named "J" particle.
At 9: 20 am this Sunday, the news of "new particles found" came from Stanford Linear Accelerator in Palo Alto, California, USA. It was discovered by a team led by American scientists. Interestingly, this new particle is also a heavy photon and has a long life. Richter's team named it ψ particle.
These two new discoveries shocked the American scientific community. After careful comparison, scientists found that J particles and ψ particles are the same kind of particles. To commemorate the achievements of Ding Zhaozhong Group and Li Xite Group, this new particle was renamed as J/ψ particle.
1976, Ding Zhaozhong and Li Xite won the nobel prize in physics for discovering the J/ψ particle.
After Li Zhengdao and Yang Zhenning, Ding Zhaozhong became the third Chinese physicist to win the Nobel Prize. Ding Zhaozhong was born in Rizhao County, Shandong Province. His grandfather Wang Yicheng followed Dr. Sun Yat-sen and died in the Revolution of 1911. Ding Zhaozhong's parents are both graduates of the University of Michigan. His father is a professor of engineering and his mother is a professor of psychology. They visited Michigan State University on 1936. Ding Zhaozhong was born in Michigan because of her mother's premature birth, and returned to China with her parents two months later.
In China, Ding Zhaozhong spent his childhood in war-torn War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression. He once crossed the Yellow River and the Yangtze River with his parents, went from Rizhao to Nanjing to go to relatives and friends, and then spent three months against the Yangtze River to Chongqing. In Chongqing, which lacked medical care and medicine, Ding Zhaozhong was almost killed by illness, but he was freed from the threat of death again and again. After recovery, he entered Ciqikou Primary School and went to Taiwan Province Province with his parents in the spring of 1948.
1956 In September, 20-year-old Ding Zhaozhong crossed the ocean to study mathematics and physics at the University of Michigan. Here, "penniless", he finished college on a scholarship and received his doctorate at 1962. 1963, teaching at Columbia University; 1967, Associate Professor, Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; 1969 promoted to professor. It takes 65,438+00 years for an ordinary person to go to college, get a doctorate and start scientific research. Because he was extremely diligent, it only took him six years.
Ding Zhaozhong has a strong enterprising spirit. Inspired by the famous physicist Professor Ulenbock, he chose experimental physics as his lifelong career and formed an indissoluble bond with high-energy physics. He said, "The most important thing in any scientific research is whether you are interested in what you are doing, in other words, whether you are enterprising." With this enterprising spirit, he can stay in the laboratory for two days and two nights, or even three days and three nights, staying by the instrument and tirelessly conducting his own experiments. It was with this persistence that he and his assistants spent sleepless nights and finally caught the J particle.
The discovery of J particle caused an uproar in physics, which surprised both experimental physicists and theoretical physicists. Professor Akers of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said: This is the greatest discovery in the study of elementary particles, which has changed the working state of all laboratories in the world. Because of this discovery, the laboratory will now look for new forms of substances brought by this field. Newsweek, published that year, said: "The discovery of J particle is a major breakthrough in basic particle science, which is of great significance and contribution to the four forces in nature that physicists have been trying to explain for nearly half a century." Jamie Wei Sen, president of MIT, said: "Professor Ding Zhaozhong's research has opened up an unknown universe for mankind and brought elementary particle physics to a new height." US President Ford also wrote to Ding Zhaozhong to congratulate him on his brilliant achievements.
Although Ding Zhaozhong has worked and lived in the United States for many years, he is still deeply attached to China who raised him. He can't forget his teenage years in China. He has always regarded himself as a descendant of the Chinese people. Therefore, before going to Stockholm to attend the Nobel Prize ceremony, he wrote to the Royal Swedish Academy of Science, asking him to break away from convention and give a speech in Chinese at the meeting, and then explain it in English. According to the regulations, the winner should speak in his own language at the award ceremony, which means that he can only speak in English. However, after consideration, the organizer agreed to Ding Zhaozhong's request.
Thus, in the three-quarters of the century since the 190 1 Nobel Prize was first awarded, Chinese, the main language of China people, which accounts for a quarter of the world's population, rang for the first time in the Nobel Prize awarding hall in Stockholm. On this day, Ding Zhaozhong excitedly boarded the platform where Roentgen, Einstein, Madame Curie and many great scientists stood and delivered a speech in Chinese. Through this speech, he sent a message to the young people in his hometown, hoping that they would attach importance to scientific experiments and make contributions to the development of science in the years to come.
The discovery of particles did not stop Ding Zhaozhong. Year after year, he persevered from one peak to another. After 1974, he continued to search and study the relationship between light and heavy photons through the detector and accidentally discovered a gluon. 1979, Mark Jay's team studying electron synchrotron in Hamburg proved the gluon phenomenon through experiments. This achievement once again caused a sensation in the field of international high-energy physics.
1983, Ding Zhaozhong chose the world's largest electron-positron collider "LEP" built at CERN for his new exploration. The unprecedented L3 experimental group led by him consists of 58/kloc-0 physicists from 43 universities and scientific research institutions in the United States, Swiss, China, French, German and Italian countries. This is by far the largest high-energy physics experimental group in the world. Under the leadership of Ding Zhaozhong, this experimental group has achieved a number of important experimental results.
When presiding over the L3 experimental group, Ding Zhaozhong began a bold research project: directly detecting antimatter in space. This particle detection device jointly developed by China, the United States and other countries is called Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer. Its core component, permanent magnet, was developed by Chinese mainland, and all electronic equipment was made by scientists in Taiwan Province. 1On June 2, 998, at 8: 06 EST/kloc-0, the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer was launched from the Kennedy Space Center with the space shuttle Discovery, which opened the prelude to the first human exploration of space.
Ding Zhaozhong said: "Understanding the material world and discovering the mysteries of nature is boundless, which goes beyond the limitations of age, times and national boundaries." For the sake of scientific progress, he is unwilling to stop exploring.