Physics Heroes & Heroines, Part VII

It’s time for another installment of Radiant’s Physics Heroes & Heroines series. You can also check out these past posts in the series, honoring many great minds:

• Physics Heroes & Heroines – Donna Strickland, James Maxwell, Heinrich Hertz, Marie Curie
• Physics Heroes & Heroines Continued – Sir Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, Max Planck
• Physics Heroines – Lena Hau, Estelle Glancy, Shirley Ann Jackson, Grace Hopper
• Physics Heroes & Heroines, Part IV –  Shuji Nakamura, Johannes Kepler, Chien-Shiung Wu, Elmer Imes
• Physics Heroes & Heroines, Part V –  Satyendra Nath Bose, Emilie du Châtelet, Augustin-Jean Fresnel, Maria Goeppert-Mayer
• Physics Heroes & Heroines: Black History Month – Gladys West, Lewis Latimer, Patricia Bath, 
   

Emmy Noether (1882 – 1935)

Born to a Jewish family in Germany, Amalie Emmy Noether studied mathematics at the University of Erlangen, where her father was a lecturer. She earned a doctorate in 1907, but due to attitudes against women in academia she wasn’t able to become an official instructor until 1919 at the University of Goettingen, after toiling for years in volunteer positions or as a teaching assistant under another (male) professor’s name. She made contributions to the theories of algebraic invariants and number fields. Her work on differential invariants in the calculus of variations led to the creation of the eponymous Noether's theorem, which has been called "one of the most important mathematical theorems ever proved in guiding the development of modern physics.”¹

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The Noether theorem is a mathematical principle that explains the connection between symmetry and conservation laws in physics (e.g., the law of conservation of energy). Albert Einstein and other great mathematicians and scientists have described her as the most important woman in the history of mathematics, “Noether’s Theorem became the foundation of quantum physics and helped Einstein formulate his general theory of relativity.”² More than a century later, Noether's ideas are still shaping how physicists think.

Albert Michelson (1852 – 1931)

Born in what is now Poland, Albert Michelson moved to the United States with his parents at the age of two. He studied at the US Naval Academy, where he excelled in optics, climatology, and technical drawing. He was fascinated with studying light, performing experiments while still at the Academy to try and measure the speed of light. He went on to become a physics professor at what is now Case Western Reserve University, and in 1892, became the first head of the physics department at the University of Chicago.  

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Michelson developed the interferometer, an important instrument for light measurement still in use today. An interferometer, as one might guess, measures interference. “Interference means that several light waves with the same wavelength can strengthen or cancel out one another, depending on whether they are in phase with one another.”³ 

Michelson’s interferometer uses a semi-transparent mirror to divide up a beam of uniform light waves. “After routing the different waves through different channels, the light waves are recombined, and the difference in the distances covered leads to phase displacement, which generates patterns. The instrument is used to measure lengths as well as velocities of light with great precision.”⁴ In 1907 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics “for his optical precision instruments and the spectroscopic and metrological investigations carried out with their aid.”⁵

Another one of his legacies is a ratio called “Michelson Contrast”. In the display industry, it is often used to measure the contrast of an optical system at various spatial frequencies in order to characterize the MTF (modulation transfer function) of the system. 
 

Walter Braithwaite (1945 - )

Engineers might still be sketching out schematic designs using T-squares on drafting tables if it weren’t for the development of CAD/CAM (computer aided design / computer aided manufacturing) systems. We have Walther Braithwaite to thank. Born in Jamaica, Braithwaite earned a BS in engineering at the American Institute of Technology, an MS in computer science from Washington University, and a Ph.D in technology and business processes from Rushmore University. As a Boeing Sloane Fellow he earned a second master’s degree in business administration at MIT. 

While working at Boeing in the 1960s, he was the senior engineer responsible for the development and adoption of computer technology in the design of the company’s aircraft. He helped “transform the field of aerospace design from a manual time-consuming process to one done almost entirely on computer.

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During his time there he oversaw much of the development and engineering operations for Boeing’s iconic 707. 727, 737, 747, 767 and the 777, which was the first commercial aircraft developed entirely using computer-aided design. Braithwaite went on to become the company’s highest-ranking Black executive and president of Boeing Africa. He’s the recipient of multiple engineering and technical honors and awards.
 

CITATIONS

1. Lederman, Leon M.; Hill, Christopher T. (2004), Symmetry and the Beautiful Universe, Amherst: Prometheus Books, ISBN 978-1-59102-242-8
2. Linder, C., “37 Women who’ve upended science, tech, and engineering for the better,” Popular Mechanics, February 5, 2020.
3. “Albert A. Michelson,” The Nobel Prize website (accessed February 21, 2025), https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/1907/michelson/facts/ 
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid.