Arthur Wightman

Arthur Strong Wightman
Born (1922-03-30)March 30, 1922
Rochester, New York
Died January 13, 2013(2013-01-13) (aged 90)[1]
Princeton, New Jersey
Nationality U.S.
Fields Physicist
Institutions Yale University (1943-44)
Princeton University (1949-71)
Alma mater Yale University (B.A., 1942)
Princeton University (Ph.D, 1949)
Doctoral advisor John Archibald Wheeler
Doctoral students Eduard Prugovecki
Arthur Jaffe
Barry Simon
Alan Sokal
Silvan S. Schweber
Jerrold Marsden
Rafael de la Llave Canosa
Oscar Lanford
Known for Quantum field theory
Wightman axioms
Notable awards Heineman Prize (1969)
Henri Poincaré Prize (1997)

Arthur Strong Wightman (March 30, 1922 – January 13, 2013) was an American mathematical physicist. He was one of the founders of the axiomatic approach to quantum field theory, and originated the set of Wightman axioms.[1][2]

Biography

Advised by John Wheeler, Wightman's 1949 Princeton doctoral dissertation was entitled The Moderation and Absorption of Negative Pions in Hydrogen. His graduate students include Arthur Jaffe, Jerrold Marsden, and Alan Sokal. His work is summarized in the classic concise monograph PCT, Spin and statistics and all that written with R. F. Streater. Its title is a play on 1066 and All That, the historical satire by Sellar and Yeatman. The PCT refers to the combined symmetry of a quantum field theory under P Parity, C charge and T time. Spin and statistics refers to the fact that in quantum field theory it can be proved that spin 1/2 particles obey Fermi-Dirac statistics whereas integer spin 0, 1, 2 particles obey Bose-Einstein statistics.[3]

Wightman was awarded the Henri Poincaré Prize of the International Association of Mathematical Physics in 1997. Until his death, he was a professor emeritus at Princeton.

Works

References

  1. 1 2 Kelly, Morgan (2013-01-30). "Princeton University - Esteemed Princeton mathematical physicist and mentor Arthur Wightman dies". Princeton.edu. Retrieved 2013-02-13.
  2. Simon, Barry, ed. (March 2015). "In Memory of Arthur Strong Wightman" (PDF). Notices of the AMS. 62 (3): 249–257.
  3. Jaffe, Arthur; Simon, Barry. "Arthur Strong Wightman (1922–2013)". International Association of Mathematical Physics News Bulletin. Retrieved 25 March 2013.
  4. Ruelle, D. (1965). "Review: R. F. Streater and A. S. Wightman, PCT, Spin and statistics, and all that". Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. 71 (1): 130–132. doi:10.1090/s0002-9904-1965-11247-2.
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