Flash of the Cathode Rays A History of JJ Thomson's Electron

About this book

Traces the evolution of the concept of electrical charge, from the earliest glow discharge studies to the final cathode ray and oil drop experiments of JJ Thomson and Robert Millikan. It also provides an overview of the history of modern physics up to the advent of the old quantum theory around 1920.

Contents

- List of illustrations
- Preface
- J J Thomson and his contemporaries
- Electromagnetic phenomena unravelled
- Cathode rays take center stage
- The English get going
- Meanwhile, back in Berlin
- The English keep going
- From Paris to the Scottish highlands
- From Liverpool to Princeton
- The race for e/m
- The charge and the mass
- Leiden, 1896
- The photoelectric effect revisited
- The Beta particle
- Evanescent rays: A French cottage industry
- Positive rays
- The electronic charge revisited, and one more controversy
- Dawning of the atomic age
- Epilogue: The next twenty years
- List of abbreviations
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Name index
- Subject index

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