Ramsey, Norman Foster

Norman Foster Ramsey (born 27.08.1915) — an American experimental physicist, member of the National Academy of Sciences (1952). Born in Washington. He graduated from Columbia University (1937), where he worked in 1942-47. From 1947 he was at Harvard University (professor from 1950). His work was in nuclear physics and elementary particle physics, chiefly the use of the molecular beam method for precision measurements of the electric and magnetic properties of nucleons, nuclei, atoms and molecules. He discovered the electric quadrupole moment of the deuteron. Studying the scattering of protons and electrons by protons, he measured the magnetic moments of many nuclei, and also of the proton, the neutron and the deuteron. In 1967 he determined the electric dipole moment of the neutron, obtaining the value (0.02 ± 0.85)-10^-22 cm (the first measurements were made in 1950). In 1956 he considered the case of negative spin temperatures and worked out the corresponding mathematical apparatus. He developed high-precision methods of molecular beam spectroscopy, in particular the method of separated oscillatory fields (1956) and the storage bulb method (1960). He built (1960) the hydrogen maser. In 1978 he was president of the American Physical Society. E. Lawrence Medal (1960), Davisson — Germer Prize (1974).