We provide a tour of Leipzig, one of the cultural centers of Germany that contributed a significant chapter in the history of physics. In the nineteenth century the city and University of Leipzig were home to one of the oldest physical institutes in Germany, and in the late 1920s the arrival of Werner Heisenberg (1901-1976), Peter Debye (1884-1966), and Friedrich Hund (1896-1997) at the University’s Physical Institute led to a flowering of physics in Leipzig that lasted until the outbreak of World War II. After the war a rebirth occurred under the leadership of Waldemar Ilberg (1901-1967), Gustav Hertz (1887-1975), and others.
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We dedicate our article to Professor Hans Wussing in honor of his eightieth birthday.
Karl-Heinz Schlote: Wolfgang Schreier is an emeritus faculty member at the University of Leipzig where he worked at the Karl Sudhoff Institute for three decades, at the end serving as Director of its Department of the History of Science. Karl-Heinz Schlote is Head of the Working Group for the History of Science and Mathematics at the Saxon Academy of Sciences in Leipzig.
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Schreier, W., Schlote, KH. The Physical Tourist. Phys. perspect. 10, 224–243 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00016-007-0356-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00016-007-0356-0
Keywords:
- University of Leipzig
- Saxon Academy of Sciences
- Werner Heisenberg
- Peter Debye
- Friedrich Hund
- Gustav Theodor Fechner
- Wilhelm Eduard Weber
- Wilhelm Wundt
- Berend Wilhelm Feddersen
- Gustav Heinrich Wiedemann
- Wilhelm Ostwald
- Karl Friedrich Zöllner
- Gustav Hertz
- electrophysics
- quantum mechanics
- nuclear physics
- nuclear reactor