Matter and Antimatter - Maurice Duquesne - 1960 torrent

The reader might wonder why a work setting out to
discuss the latest developments in nuclear physics
should be called Matter and Antimatter.
The reason
is that the recent discovery of anti-protons and
anti-neutrons, completing the list of antiparticles,
has led physicists to coin the word \'antimatter . We
shall be careful in our use of this word, if only to
bring it down from the fantastic heights to which
the. popular press has elevated it.
On the whole, attempts at popularisation are
laudable enough, but when it comes to modern
physics they are fraught with danger. Here reality
is often represented by mathematical
equations
beyond the reader\'s grasp, a fact which encourages
many a sensationalist writer to indulge in fantasies.
The current interest in anti-particles is by no means
due to their novelty—their existence was predicted
in a theoretical paper published as long ago as March
1930, and the first anti-particle (the positive electron)
was observed and identified in 1933. At the time the
news caused no stir outside the very narrow circle
of specialists.
Nowadays, the moment a new particle is identified,
it is announced to the public, and despite the reserve
of physicists, the popular press has no hesitation in
pontificating about its unknown properties.
Though not brand-new, therefore, the problem of
anti-particles is nevertheless of great interest, no only because of the old questions it resolves but also
because of the new questions it poses.
The discovery of anti-protons and anti-neutrons
has confirmed the general validity of the theory,
presented by Dirac, a young English mathematician,
to the Royal Society on the 6th December, 1929.
Do anti-particles have the property of combining
to form a negative anti-nucleus which, together with
positive electrons would make up an anti-atom? Is
this how we must conceive the structure of so-called
antimatter?
Inasmuch as so small a book can do justice to the
labours of some of the greatest scientists of the past
thirty years, I shall try to show what discoveries have
led physicists to ask these and similar questions.

No ISBN
127 pages