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Arthur Holly Compton (September 10, 1892 – March 15, 1962) was an American physicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1927 for his discovery of the Compton effect, which demonstrated the particle nature of electromagnetic radiation. It was a sensational discovery at the time: the wave nature of light had been well-demonstrated, but the idea that light had both wave and particle properties was not easily accepted. He is also known for his leadership of the Manhattan Project's Metallurgical Laboratory, and served as Chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis from 1945 to 1953. In 1919, Compton was awarded one of the first two National Research Council Fellowships that allowed students to study abroad. He chose to go to Cambridge University's Cavendish Laboratory in England, where he studied the scattering and absorption of gamma rays. Further research along these lines led to the discovery of the Compton effect. He used X-rays to investigate ferromagnetism, concluding that it was a result of the alignment of electron spins, and studied cosmic rays, discovering that they were made up principally of positively charged particles. During World War II, Compton was a key figure in the Manhattan Project that developed the first nuclear weapons. His reports were important in launching the project. In 1942, he became head of the Metallurgical Laboratory, with responsibility for producing nuclear reactors to convert uranium into plutonium, finding ways to separate the plutonium from the uranium and to design an atomic bomb. Compton oversaw Enrico Fermi's creation of Chicago Pile-1, the first nuclear reactor, which went critical on December 2, 1942. The Metallurgical Laboratory was also responsible for the design and operation of the X-10 Graphite Reactor at Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Plutonium began being produced in the Hanford Site reactors in 1945. After the war, Compton became Chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis. During his tenure, the university formally desegregated its undergraduate divisions, named its first female full professor, and enrolled a record number of students after wartime veterans returned to the United States. == Early life == Arthur Compton was born on September 10, 1892 in Wooster, Ohio, the son of Elias and Otelia Catherine (née Augspurger) Compton, who was named American Mother of the Year in 1939.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Past National Mothers of the Year )〕 They were an academic family. Elias was dean of the University of Wooster (later The College of Wooster), which Arthur also attended. Arthur's eldest brother, Karl, who also attended Wooster, earned a PhD in physics from Princeton University in 1912, and was president of MIT from 1930 to 1948. His second brother Wilson likewise attended Wooster, earned his PhD in economics from Princeton in 1916 and was president of the State College of Washington, later Washington State University from 1944 to 1951. All three brothers were members of the Alpha Tau Omega fraternity.〔(【引用サイトリンク】accessdate=August 10, 2013 )〕 Compton was initially interested in astronomy, and took a photograph of Halley's Comet in 1910. Around 1913, he described an experiment where an examination of the motion of water in a circular tube demonstrated the rotation of the earth. That year, he graduated from Wooster with a Bachelor of Science degree and entered Princeton, where he received his Master of Arts degree in 1914.〔 Compton then studied for his PhD in physics under the supervision of Hereward L. Cooke, writing his dissertation on "The intensity of X-ray reflection, and the distribution of the electrons in atoms".〔(【引用サイトリンク】accessdate=July 24, 2013 )〕 When Arthur Compton earned his PhD in 1916, he, Karl and Wilson became the first group of three brothers to earn PhDs from Princeton. Later, they would become the first such trio to simultaneously head American colleges. Their sister Mary married a missionary, C. Herbert Rice, who became the principal of Forman Christian College in Lahore. In June 1916, Compton married Betty Charity McCloskey, a Wooster classmate and fellow graduate. They had two sons, Arthur Alan and John Joseph Compton. Compton spent a year as a physics instructor at the University of Minnesota in 1916–17, then two years as a research engineer with the Westinghouse Lamp Company in Pittsburgh, where he worked on the development of the sodium-vapor lamp. During World War I he developed aircraft instrumentation for the Signal Corps. In 1919, Compton was awarded one of the first two National Research Council Fellowships that allowed students to study abroad. He chose to go to Cambridge University's Cavendish Laboratory in England. Working with George Paget Thomson, the son of J. J. Thomson, Compton studied the scattering and absorption of gamma rays. He observed that the scattered rays were more easily absorbed than the original source.〔 Compton was greatly impressed by the Cavendish scientists, especially Ernest Rutherford, Charles Galton Darwin and Arthur Eddington, and he ultimately named his second son after J. J. Thomson. For a time Compton was a deacon at a Baptist church. "Science can have no quarrel", he said, "with a religion which postulates a God to whom men are as His children." 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Arthur Compton」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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