Marian Smoluchowski

Marian Smoluchowski from ( born May 28, 1872 in front Brühl bei Wien, † September 5, 1917 in Krakow, Galicia ) was an Austrian- Polish physicist.

Life

Smoluchowski studied physics in Vienna, where Franz Serafin Exner - Joseph and Stefan were his teachers. In 1894 he received the highest accolade for his doctorate, Sub auspiciis Imperatoris. Ludwig Boltzmann taught at the University of Munich, while Smoluchowski studied in Vienna, and in 1894 he returned back as Smoluchowski served in the Austro -Hungarian army. Thus, it appears that the two were not in direct contact with each other. After a few years he spent at other universities (Paris, Glasgow and Berlin), in 1899 he moved to Lviv, where he accepted a post at the university there Lviv. In 1901, he married Zofia Baraniecka and had with her two children: Aldona ( 1902-1984 ) and Roman ( 1910-1996 )

Smoluchowski moved to Krakow in 1913, where he became professor of experimental physics from August Witkowski ( 1854-1913 ). After the First World War had broken out, the working conditions were more difficult, and even the spacious and modern building of the physics department was converted into a hospital for military authorities. Smoluchowski was therefore forced to work in the former department of the late Karol Olszewski, where, however, he did not even have access to the simplest demonstration aids. Among his pupils were Patkowski Jozef, Stanislaw Loria (1883-1958) and Waclaw Dziewulski ( 1882-1938 ).

His favorite pastimes were skiing, mountain climbing, painting and playing the piano. Smoluchowski died in 1917 as a victim of a dysentery epidemic.

Work

Smoluchowski 1904 was the first physicist who recognized that gases and liquids are subjected to density fluctuations, but he calculated the average particle density in an ideal gas. In 1908, he realized that for large density fluctuations, the phenomenon of critical opalescence occurs. He noticed this and the dispersion of light in the atmosphere, which is responsible for the blue color of the sky.

1906 he described and explained independently by Albert Einstein Brownian motion. Smoluchowski thereby presented an equation, which plays an important role in the understanding of the diffusion and is based on the theory of stochastic processes. 1910-1916, he examined the relationship between reversibility and irreversibility.

Marian Smoluchowski Emil Warburg Physics Prize

This with a silver medal, a certificate and a cash prize of € 3,000 in prize is awarded in memory of Marian von Smoluchowski and Emil Warburg, since 1997 every two years alternately to a German or Polish physicist jointly by the German Physical Society and the Polish Physical Society.