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Autograph manuscript signed (at head 'Louis de Broglie'), ‘L’Univers à cinq dimensions et la Mécanique ondulatoire’ (The five-dimensional universe and wave mechanics), [1927]
Details
Louis de Broglie (1892-1987)
Autograph manuscript signed (at head 'Louis de Broglie'), ‘L’Univers à cinq dimensions et la Mécanique ondulatoire’ (The five-dimensional universe and wave mechanics), [1927]
In French. 12½ pages, 271 x 210mm, cancellations and emendations by de Broglie, written on rectos with cancelled notes on two versos, marked up in pencil by the editor; tipped into an album. Green half-morocco binding by A. Devauchelle. Provenance: Christie's Paris, 'Collection de livres de science et medecine', 25 June 2004, lot 35.
On a 5-dimensional model for reconciling Einstein's general relativity with wave mechanics: an early attempt at unified field theory. De Broglie explicitly takes as his starting point Einstein's equivalence principle, which 'eliminated the metaphysical notion of force from the theory of gravitation', and the fact that general relativity has reduced known forces to only two types – gravitational and electromagnetic. He goes on: 'To complete Einstein's work and to reduce the electromagnetic force to geometric quantities, Messrs Kaluza and Kramers developed a bold but very beautiful theory: the 5-dimensional theory of relativity. Mr O. Klein showed that this 5-dimensional relativity made it possible to write the equations of the new wave mechanics in a remarkably symmetrical way ...'. The remainder of the paper proposes that the wave-like behaviour of particles may be explained geometrically as the unseen fifth dimension of Kaluza-Kramers-Klein theory, and attempts to establish a new set of equations which would incorporate electromagnetism into the geometry of space-time
Published in the Journal de physique, 1927 (VIth series, 2, 65-73). De Broglie is the father of wave mechanics: his 1924 PhD thesis postulated the de Broglie hypothesis, that electrons (and by extension all matter) have wave-like properties, which became a central element of quantum mechanics: the experimental confirmation of this in 1927 earned de Broglie the Nobel Prize two years later. The attempt to integrate electromagnetism into general relativity to produce a unified field theory was to dominate the work of Einstein himself from this date onwards, and in the period 1938 to 1943 he focused his efforts specifically on the potential of five-dimensional Kaluza-Klein theory explored here by de Broglie.
Autograph manuscript signed (at head 'Louis de Broglie'), ‘L’Univers à cinq dimensions et la Mécanique ondulatoire’ (The five-dimensional universe and wave mechanics), [1927]
In French. 12½ pages, 271 x 210mm, cancellations and emendations by de Broglie, written on rectos with cancelled notes on two versos, marked up in pencil by the editor; tipped into an album. Green half-morocco binding by A. Devauchelle. Provenance: Christie's Paris, 'Collection de livres de science et medecine', 25 June 2004, lot 35.
On a 5-dimensional model for reconciling Einstein's general relativity with wave mechanics: an early attempt at unified field theory. De Broglie explicitly takes as his starting point Einstein's equivalence principle, which 'eliminated the metaphysical notion of force from the theory of gravitation', and the fact that general relativity has reduced known forces to only two types – gravitational and electromagnetic. He goes on: 'To complete Einstein's work and to reduce the electromagnetic force to geometric quantities, Messrs Kaluza and Kramers developed a bold but very beautiful theory: the 5-dimensional theory of relativity. Mr O. Klein showed that this 5-dimensional relativity made it possible to write the equations of the new wave mechanics in a remarkably symmetrical way ...'. The remainder of the paper proposes that the wave-like behaviour of particles may be explained geometrically as the unseen fifth dimension of Kaluza-Kramers-Klein theory, and attempts to establish a new set of equations which would incorporate electromagnetism into the geometry of space-time
Published in the Journal de physique, 1927 (VIth series, 2, 65-73). De Broglie is the father of wave mechanics: his 1924 PhD thesis postulated the de Broglie hypothesis, that electrons (and by extension all matter) have wave-like properties, which became a central element of quantum mechanics: the experimental confirmation of this in 1927 earned de Broglie the Nobel Prize two years later. The attempt to integrate electromagnetism into general relativity to produce a unified field theory was to dominate the work of Einstein himself from this date onwards, and in the period 1938 to 1943 he focused his efforts specifically on the potential of five-dimensional Kaluza-Klein theory explored here by de Broglie.
Présenté par
Eugenio Donadoni
Senior Specialist, Medieval & Renaissance Manuscripts