Brian David Josephson

British physicist (1940–)

Josephson was born in Cardiff and educated at Cambridge University, where he obtained his PhD in 1964. He remained at Cambridge and in 1974 was appointed to a professorship of physics.

His name is associated with the Josephson effects described in 1962 while he was still a graduate student. The work came out of theoretical speculations on electrons in semiconductors involving the exchange of electrons between two superconducting regions separated by a thin insulating layer (a Josephson junction). He showed theoretically that a current can flow across the junction in the absence of an applied voltage. Furthermore, a small direct voltage across the junction produces an alternating current with a frequency that is inversely proportional to the voltage. The effects have been verified experimentally, thus supporting the BCS theory of superconductivity of John Bardeen and his colleagues. They have been used in making accurate physical measurements and in measuring weak magnetic fields. Josephson junctions can also be used as very fast switching devices in computers. For this work Josephson shared the 1973 Nobel Prize for physics with Leo Esaki and Ivar Giaever.

Later, Josephson turned his attention to the study of the mind and has argued strongly for a connection between parapsychology and quantum mechanics.

For more information on Brian David Josephson, visit Britannica.com.

Brian David Josephson

Brian David Josephson (born Cardiff, Wales, UK, 4 January, 1940) is a British physicist whose discovery of the Josephson effect as a 22-year-old graduate student won him the 1973 Nobel Prize for Physics, which he shared with Leo Esaki and Ivar Giaever. From Fall 2007, he is a retired professor at the University of Cambridge where he is the head of the mind-matter unification project in the Theory of Condensed Matter research group. He is also a fellow of Trinity College.^[1]

Paranormal

Josephson is one of the more well-known scientists who believe that parapsychological phenomena may be real, and is also interested in the possibility that Eastern mysticism may have relevance to scientific understanding.^[2] He has said that one of his guiding principles has been 'Take nobody's word for it' (nullius in verba), saying that "if scientists as a whole denounce an idea, this should not necessarily be taken as proof that the said idea is absurd; rather, one should examine carefully the alleged grounds for such opinions and judge how well these stand up to detailed scrutiny."^[3]

See also

• List of physicists
• Scientific phenomena named after people
• "Brian Josephson Eight Years Later" by Philip Anderson, Physics Today, November 1970. Anderson's account (he taught the graduate course in solid-state/many-body theory in which Josephson was a student) of Josephson's discovery.

References

1. ^ http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/josephson.html Jewish Virtual Library on Brian David Josephson, Retrieved Sept 17, 2007
2. ^ http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9044004/Brian-D-Josephson Encyclopedia Britannica Online, Retrieved Sept 17, 2007
3. ^ http://www.tcm.phy.cam.ac.uk/~bdj10/ Brian David Josephson's home page, Retrieved Sept 17, 2007

External links

• Brian Josephson's home page - Mind-Matter Unification project
• Josephson, Brian D. Biography by Britannica

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Nobel Prize in Physics Laureates
1901-1925	Röntgen (1901) · Lorentz / Zeeman (1902) · Becquerel / P.Curie / M.Curie (1903) · Rayleigh (1904) · Lenard (1905) · Thomson (1906) · Michelson (1907) · Lippmann (1908) · Marconi / Braun (1909) · van der Waals (1910) · Wien (1911) · Dalén (1912) · Kamerlingh Onnes (1913) · von Laue (1914) · W.L.Bragg / W.H.Bragg (1915) · Barkla (1917) · Planck (1918) · Stark (1919) · Guillaume (1920) · Einstein (1921) · N.Bohr (1922) · Millikan (1923) · M.Siegbahn (1924) · Franck / Hertz (1925)
1926-1950	Perrin (1926) · Compton / C.Wilson (1927) · O.Richardson (1928) · De Broglie (1929) · Raman (1930) · Heisenberg (1932) · Schrödinger / Dirac (1933) · Chadwick (1935) · Hess / C.D.Anderson (1936) · Davisson / Thomson (1937) · Fermi (1938) · Lawrence (1939) · Stern (1943) · Rabi (1944) · Pauli (1945) · Bridgman (1946) · Appleton (1947) · Blackett (1948) · Yukawa (1949) · Powell (1950)
1951-1975	Cockcroft / Walton (1951) · Bloch / Purcell (1952) · Zernike (1953) · Born / Bothe (1954) · Lamb / Kusch (1955) · Shockley / Bardeen / Brattain (1956) · Yang / T.D.Lee (1957) · Čerenkov / Frank / Tamm (1958) · Segrè / Chamberlain (1959) · Glaser (1960) · Hofstadter / Mössbauer (1961) · Landau (1962) · Wigner / Goeppert‑Mayer / Jensen (1963) · Townes / Basov / Prokhorov (1964) · Tomonaga / Schwinger / Feynman (1965) · Kastler (1966) · Bethe (1967) · Alvarez (1968) · Gell-Mann (1969) · Alfvén / Néel (1970) · Gabor (1971) · Bardeen / Cooper / Schrieffer (1972) · Esaki / Giaever / Josephson (1973) · Ryle / Hewish (1974) · A.Bohr / Mottelson / Rainwater (1975)
1976-2000	Richter / Ting (1976) · P.W.Anderson / Mott / van Vleck (1977) · Kapitsa / Penzias / R.Wilson (1978) · Glashow / Salam / Weinberg (1979) · Cronin / Fitch (1980) · Bloembergen / Schawlow / K.Siegbahn (1981) · K.Wilson (1982) · Chandrasekhar / Fowler (1983) · Rubbia / van der Meer (1984) · von Klitzing (1985) · Ruska / Binnig / Rohrer (1986) · Bednorz / Müller (1987) · Lederman / Schwartz / Steinberger (1988) · Ramsey / Dehmelt / Paul (1989) · Friedman / Kendall / R. Taylor (1990) · de Gennes (1991) · Charpak (1992) · Hulse / J. Taylor (1993) · Brockhouse / Shull (1994) · Perl / Reines (1995) · D.Lee / Osheroff / R.Richardson (1996) · Chu / Cohen-Tannoudji / Phillips (1997) · Laughlin / Störmer / Tsui (1998) · 't Hooft / Veltman (1999) · Alferov / Kroemer / Kilby (2000)
2001-2025	Cornell / Ketterle / Wieman (2001) · Davis / Koshiba / Giacconi (2002) · Abrikosov / Ginzburg / Leggett (2003) · Gross / Politzer / Wilczek (2004) · Glauber / Hall / Hänsch (2005) · Mather / Smoot (2006) · Fert / Grünberg (2007)

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