125-718: Albrecht von Müller (born in 1954) is a German philosopher and former entrepreneur. Since 2000, Müller has been the director of the Parmenides Center for the Study of Thinking, which is run by the non-profit organization Parmenides Foundation (founded by Müller) and is associated with the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich . He is also a teacher of philosophy at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich as well as teaching
250-631: A Privatdozent . A thesis was not required; the Chemical Institute accepted one of his publications on radioactivity instead. Most of the organic chemists at the Chemical Institute did not regard Hahn's work as real chemistry. Fischer objected to Hahn's contention in his habilitation colloquium that many radioactive substances existed in such tiny amounts that they could only be detected by their radioactivity, venturing that he had always been able to detect substances with his keen sense of smell, but soon gave in. One department head remarked: "it
375-469: A hydrofluoric acid solution with tantalic acid . First the tantalum in the ore was precipitated, then the protactinium. In addition to the uranium X1 (thorium-234) and uranium X2 (protactinium-234), Hahn detected traces of a radioactive substance with a half-life of between 6 and 7 hours. There was one isotope known to have a half-life of 6.2 hours, mesothorium II (actinium-228). This was not in any probable decay chain, but it could have been contamination, as
500-406: A radioactive recoil in 1904, but interpreted it wrongly. Hahn and Meitner succeeded in demonstrating the radioactive recoil incident to alpha particle emission and interpreted it correctly. Hahn pursued a report by Stefan Meyer and Egon Schweidler of a decay product of actinium with a half-life of about 11.8 days. Hahn determined that it was actinium X ( radium-223 ). He also discovered that at
625-765: A book in English (and later in Russian) titled Applied Radiochemistry , which contained the lectures given by Hahn when he was a visiting professor at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York , in 1933. This publication had a major influence on almost all nuclear chemists and physicists in the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and the Soviet Union during the 1930s and 1940s. Hahn is referred to as
750-481: A bright future, and that someone who had discovered a new radioactive element should go to the University of Berlin . Ramsay wrote to Emil Fischer , the head of the chemistry institute there, who replied that Hahn could work in his laboratory, but could not be a Privatdozent because radiochemistry was not taught there. At this point, Hahn decided that he first needed to know more about the subject, so he wrote to
875-431: A cloud of arsenicals . In 1913, chemists Frederick Soddy and Kasimir Fajans independently observed that alpha decay caused atoms to move down two places on the periodic table , while the loss of two beta particles restored it to its original position. Under the resulting reorganisation of the periodic table, radium was placed in group II, actinium in group III, thorium in group IV and uranium in group VI. This left
1000-460: A complex mix of half-lives. Fermi therefore concluded that the new elements with atomic numbers greater than 92 (known as transuranium elements ) had been created. Meitner and Hahn had not collaborated for many years, but Meitner was eager to investigate Fermi's results. Hahn, initially, was not, but he changed his mind when Aristid von Grosse suggested that what Fermi had found was an isotope of protactinium. They set out to determine whether or not
1125-410: A compound of thorium X and stupidity. Boltwood was soon convinced that it did exist, although he and Hahn differed on what its half-life was. William Henry Bragg and Richard Kleeman had noted that the alpha particles emitted from radioactive substances always had the same energy, providing a second way of identifying them, so Hahn set about measuring the alpha particle emissions of radiothorium. In
1250-528: A dissertation entitled "On Bromine Derivates of Isoeugenol", a topic in classical organic chemistry . He completed his one-year military service (instead of the usual two because he had a doctorate) in the 81st Infantry Regiment, but unlike his brothers, did not apply for a commission. He then returned to the University of Marburg, where he worked for two years as assistant to his doctoral supervisor, Geheimrat professor Theodor Zincke . Hahn's intention
1375-505: A doctorate from the University of Vienna , and had already published two papers on radioactivity. Rubens suggested her as a possible collaborator. So began the thirty-year collaboration and lifelong close friendship between the two scientists. In Montreal, Hahn had worked with physicists including at least one woman, Harriet Brooks , but it was difficult for Meitner at first. Women were not yet admitted to universities in Prussia . Meitner
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#17327732242661500-420: A gap between thorium and uranium. Soddy predicted that this unknown element, which he referred to (after Dmitri Mendeleev ) as "ekatantalium", would be an alpha emitter with chemical properties similar to tantalium . It was not long before Fajans and Oswald Helmuth Göhring discovered it as a decay product of a beta-emitting product of thorium. Based on the radioactive displacement law of Fajans and Soddy , this
1625-517: A gas (generally called an emanation), identical with the radioactive emanation from thorium. Another theory of deep interest is that it is the possible source of a radioactive element possibly stronger in radioactivity than radium itself, and capable of producing all the curious effects which are known of radium up to the present. – The discoverer read a paper on the subject to the Royal Society last week, and this should rank, when published, among
1750-399: A group 2 metal was problematic, because it did not logically fit with the other elements found thus far. Hahn initially suspected it to be radium, produced by splitting off two alpha-particles from the uranium nucleus, but chipping off two alpha particles via this process was unlikely. The idea of turning uranium into barium (by removing around 100 nucleons) was seen as preposterous. During
1875-437: A half life of 1.7 minutes, Hahn and Meitner's isotope had one of 32,500 years. The name brevium no longer seemed appropriate. Fajans agreed to Meitner and Hahn naming the element " protoactinium ". In June 1918, Soddy and John Cranston announced that they had extracted a sample of the isotope, but unlike Hahn and Meitner were unable to describe its characteristics. They acknowledged Hahn´s and Meitner's priority, and agreed to
2000-621: A long tradition of hosting summer programs for international students. The LMU Munich organised its Summer University for the first time in 1927. Labelled as Sommerkurse für Ausländer ( Summer Courses for Foreigners ) the Summer University ran annually until 1934 and primarily consisted of German Language courses for international students. After a longer intermittence period, LMU's Summer University resumed as Internationaler Münchner Sommer ( International Summer in Munich ). Since then
2125-479: A new class of reaction and the alpha decay of uranium, neither of which had ever been reported before, and for which physical evidence was lacking. Hahn and Strassmann refined their chemical procedures, while Meitner devised new experiments to shine more light on the reaction processes. In May 1937, they issued parallel reports, one in the Zeitschrift für Physik with Meitner as the principal author, and one in
2250-597: A number of reforms that sought to modernize the rather conservative and Jesuit-influenced university. In 1826, it was moved to Munich , the capital of the Kingdom of Bavaria . The university was situated in the Old Academy until a new building in the Ludwigstraße was completed. The locals were somewhat critical of the number of Protestant professors Maximilian and later Ludwig I invited to Munich. They were dubbed
2375-645: A result of cooperation between the university and renowned external partners from academia and industry; the Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society , for example, was established through a joint initiative between LMU Munich and the Deutsches Museum , while the Parmenides Center for the Study of Thinking resulted from the collaboration between the Parmenides Foundation and LMU Munich's Human Science Center. Some of
2500-541: A site where the Italian trenches were sheltered in a deep valley so that a gas cloud would persist. The following Battle of Caporetto broke the Italian lines, and the Central Powers overran much of northern Italy. That summer Hahn was accidentally poisoned by phosgene while testing a new model of gas mask. At the end of the war he was in the field in mufti on a secret mission to test a pot that heated and released
2625-588: A special nose for discovering new elements." In 1906, Hahn returned to Germany, where Fischer placed at his disposal a former woodworking shop ( Holzwerkstatt ) in the basement of the Chemical Institute to use as a laboratory. Hahn equipped it with electroscopes to measure alpha and beta particles and gamma rays . In Montreal these had been made from discarded coffee tins; Hahn made the ones in Berlin from brass, with aluminium strips insulated with amber. These were charged with hard rubber sticks that he rubbed against
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#17327732242662750-516: A university vice president on suspicion of embezzlement. The vice president should have claimed "excessive travel expenses". The following year, veterinary students reported that the LMU violated animal welfare standards. According to them, the LMU keeps pigs in tight grid boxes, so that some animals showed scratches, bumps and respiratory diseases from lying down. Students who reported these circumstances said that they were threatened with deregistration from
2875-497: A very different note to Hahn, reporting that: Also miissen die ProzesSe Einfangprozesse des Uran 238 sein, was zu drei isomeren Kernen Uran 239 fiihrt. Dieses Ergebnis ist mit den bisherigen Kernvorstellungen sehr schwer in Ubereinstimmung zu bringen ("The process must be neutron capture by uranium-238, which leads to three isomeric nuclei of uranium-239. This result is very difficult to reconcile with current concepts of
3000-410: A visit to Copenhagen on 10 November, Hahn discussed these results with Niels Bohr , Meitner, and Otto Robert Frisch . Further refinements of the technique, leading to the decisive experiment on 16–17 December 1938, produced puzzling results: the three isotopes consistently behaved not as radium, but as barium. Hahn, who did not inform the physicists in his Institute, described the results exclusively in
3125-611: Is a public research university in Munich , Bavaria , Germany . Originally established as the University of Ingolstadt in 1472 by Duke Ludwig IX of Bavaria-Landshut , it is Germany's sixth-oldest university in continuous operation. In 1800, the university was moved from Ingolstadt to Landshut by King Maximilian I Joseph of Bavaria when the city was threatened by the French, before being transferred to its present-day location in Munich in 1826 by King Ludwig I of Bavaria . In 1802,
3250-519: Is also known for the controversial Swiss dot com bubble company Think Tools AG . The March 2000 initial public offering of Think Tools AG made Müller, as the biggest shareholder, one of the wealthiest people in Switzerland for a short time. The software Think Tools sold by the company claimed to provide an aid to decision making for large multinationals and governments. The company gained negative publicity because of its suspicious relations with
3375-532: Is incredible what one gets to be a Privatdozent these days!" Physicists were more accepting of Hahn's work, and he began attending a colloquium at the Physics Institute conducted by Heinrich Rubens . It was at one of these colloquia where, on 28 September 1907, he made the acquaintance of the Austrian physicist Lise Meitner . Almost the same age as himself, she was only the second woman to receive
3500-480: The Chemische Berichte with Hahn as the principal author. Hahn concluded his by stating emphatically: Vor allem steht ihre chemische Verschiedenheit von allen bisher bekannten Elementen außerhalb jeder Diskussion ("Above all, their chemical distinction from all previously known elements needs no further discussion"). Meitner, however, was increasingly uncertain. She considered the possibility that
3625-514: The Battle of Bolimów on 12 June 1915, they released a mixture of chlorine and phosgene gas. Some German troops were reluctant to advance when the gas started to blow back, so Hahn led them across No Man's land . He witnessed the death agonies of Russians they had poisoned, and unsuccessfully attempted to revive some with gas masks. He was transferred to Berlin as a human guinea pig testing poisonous gases and gas masks. On their next attempt on 7 July,
3750-846: The Federation of German Scientists , a non-governmental organisation committed to the ideal of responsible science. As he worked to rebuild German science, he became one of the most influential and respected citizens of post-war West Germany . Otto Hahn was born in Frankfurt am Main on 8 March 1879, the youngest son of Heinrich Hahn (1845–1922), a prosperous glazier (and founder of the Glasbau Hahn company), and Charlotte Hahn née Giese (1845–1905). He had an older half-brother Karl, his mother's son from her previous marriage, and two older brothers, Heiner and Julius. The family lived above his father's workshop. The younger three boys were educated at
3875-491: The German Research Foundation (DFG) of 2021, which breaks down the grants from 2017 to 2019, LMU Munich ranked 1st among German universities. By area, it ranked 1st in the life sciences , 2nd in the humanities and social sciences , and 6th in the natural sciences . In November 2018 Expertscape recognized it as one of the top ten institutions in the world in pancreatic cancer . The LMU and
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4000-593: The Klinger Oberrealschule in Frankfurt. At the age of 15, he began to take a special interest in chemistry, and carried out simple experiments in the laundry room of the family home. His father wanted Otto to study architecture, as he had built or acquired several residential and business properties, but Otto persuaded him that his ambition was to become an industrial chemist . In 1897, after passing his Abitur , Hahn began to study chemistry at
4125-572: The Society of German Chemists when it became part of the Nazi German Labour Front . As a result, he could neither work in the chemical industry nor receive his habilitation, the prerequisite for an academic position. Meitner persuaded Hahn to hire Strassmann as an assistant. Soon he would be credited as a third collaborator on the papers they produced, and would sometimes even be listed first. Hahn spent February to June 1933 in
4250-497: The Technical University of Munich have come together to work on "One Munich Strategy Forum", with a €2.5 million fund from the state of Bavaria . The Munich International Summer University (MISU at LMU) is the Summer University by LMU, which takes place annually in Munich and depending on the course also involves stays at different European cities. MISU invites international students to attend short-term programs at
4375-805: The Third Reich , academic freedom was severely curtailed. In 1943, the White Rose group, consisting of anti-Nazi students, carried out a campaign opposing the National Socialists at this institution. The university subsequently removed Kurt Huber, a Nazi opposition fighter, from his position and revoked his doctorate upon his arrest. Between 1933 and 1936, Karl Escherich served as rector at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, followed by Leopold Kölbl from 1936 to 1938, Philipp Broemser from 1938 to 1941, and finally, Walther Wüst from 1941 to 1945. The university has continued to be one of
4500-744: The University of Marburg . His subsidiary subjects were mathematics, physics , mineralogy and philosophy. Hahn joined the Students' Association of Natural Sciences and Medicine, a student fraternity and a forerunner of today's Landsmannschaft Nibelungi ( Coburger Convent der akademischen Landsmannschaften und Turnerschaften ). He spent his third and fourth semesters at the University of Munich , studying organic chemistry under Adolf von Baeyer , physical chemistry under Wilhelm Muthmann [ de ] , and inorganic chemistry under Karl Andreas Hofmann . In 1901, Hahn received his doctorate in Marburg for
4625-501: The World Economic Forum , through accusations of plagiarism related to its main software product, as well as the software lacking most of the capabilities it was advertised to have. The value of the company collapsed in 2001. Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (simply University of Munich , LMU or LMU Munich ; German: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München )
4750-484: The atomic nucleus more easily than protons or alpha particles. Enrico Fermi and his colleagues in Rome picked up on this idea, and began irradiating elements with neutrons. The radioactive displacement law of Fajans and Soddy said that beta decay causes isotopes to move one element up on the periodic table, and alpha decay causes them to move two down. When Fermi's group bombarded uranium atoms with neutrons, they found
4875-581: The co-precipitation of minute quantities of radioactive materials when insoluble substances were precipitated from aqueous solutions. I recall reading and rereading every word in these laws of co-precipitation many times, attempting to derive every possible bit of guidance for our work, and perhaps in my zealousness reading into them more than the master himself had intended. I doubt that I have read sections in any other book more carefully or more frequently than those in Hahn's Applied Radiochemistry . In fact, I read
5000-730: The fission products of uranium. At the end of the war he was arrested by the Allied forces and detained in Farm Hall with nine other German scientists, from July 1945 to January 1946. Hahn served as the last president of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society for the Advancement of Science in 1946 and as the founding president of its successor, the Max Planck Society from 1948 to 1960. In 1959 in Berlin he co-founded
5125-466: The "Nordlichter" (northern lights), and especially physician Johann Nepomuk von Ringseis was quite angry about them. In the second half of the 19th century, the university rose to great prominence in the European scientific community, attracting many of the world's leading scientists. It was also a period of great expansion. From 1903, women were allowed to study at Bavarian universities, and by 1918,
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5250-579: The "Poet of the East" and "The Thinker of Pakistan", earned his PhD degree from the Ludwig Maximilian University, Munich in 1908. Working under the guidance of Friedrich Hommel , Iqbal published his doctoral thesis in 1908, entitled The Development of Metaphysics in Persia . The anti-Nazi resistance White Rose was based in this university. Otto Hahn Otto Hahn ( pronounced [ˈɔtoː ˈhaːn] ; 8 March 1879 – 28 July 1968)
5375-511: The 13-minute isotope was indeed an isotope of protactinium. Between 1934 and 1938, Hahn, Meitner and Strassmann found a great number of radioactive transmutation products, all of which they regarded as transuranic. At that time, the existence of actinides was not yet established, and uranium was wrongly believed to be a group 6 element similar to tungsten . It followed that the first transuranic elements would be similar to group 7 to 10 elements, i.e. rhenium and platinoids . They established
5500-679: The 45,000 students who attend the university come from abroad. In 2005, Germany's state and federal governments launched the German Universities Excellence Initiative , a contest among its universities. With a total of 1.9 billion euros, 75 percent of which comes from the federal state, its architects aim to strategically promote top-level research and scholarship. The money is given to more than 30 research universities in Germany. The initiative will fund three project-oriented areas: graduate schools to promote
5625-477: The Elite Network of Bavaria, an educational policy concept of Bavaria for the promotion of gifted pupils and students in the higher education sector. It attracts an additional 120 million euros per year in outside funding and is intensively involved in national and international funding initiatives. LMU Munich has a wide range of degree programs, with 150 subjects available in numerous combinations. 15% of
5750-539: The Initiative: one graduate school, three "excellence clusters" and general funding for the university's "future concept". In January 2012, scientists at the Ludwig Maximilian University published details of the most sensitive listening device known so far. This has led to the college being inducted into the Guinness Book of World Records. In September 2018, the Munich public prosecutor's office investigated
5875-505: The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry ( IUPAC ) named the new element definitively protactinium, and confirmed Hahn and Meitner as discoverers. With the discovery of protactinium, most of the decay chains of uranium had been mapped. When Hahn returned to his work after the war, he looked back over his 1914 results, and considered some anomalies that had been dismissed or overlooked. He dissolved uranium salts in
6000-540: The KWI for Chemistry's party steward ( Vertrauensmann ). While Hahn was in North America in 1905–1906, his attention had been drawn to a mica-like mineral from Manitoba that contained rubidium . He had studied the radioactive decay of rubidium-87 , and had estimated its half-life at 2 x 10 years. It occurred to him that by comparing the quantity of strontium in the mineral (which had once been rubidium) with that of
6125-426: The KWI for Chemistry. Hahn therefore did not have to fire any of his own full-time staff, but as the interim director of Haber's institute, he dismissed a quarter of its staff, including three department heads. Gerhart Jander was appointed the new director of Haber's old institute, and reoriented it towards chemical warfare research. Like most KWS institute directors, Haber had accrued a large discretionary fund. It
6250-453: The KWICy had experimented with it. Hahn and Meitner demonstrated in 1919 that when actinium is treated with hydrofluoric acid, it remains in the insoluble residue. Since mesothorium II was an isotope of actinium, the substance was not mesothorium II; it was protactinium. Hahn was now confident enough he had found something that he named his new isotope "uranium Z". In February 1921, he published
6375-516: The LMU Munich in order to progress academically even in winter or summer breaks at their home university. MISU hereby offers two course formats: On the one hand German Language classes are held at different times over the year. On the other hand, MISU offers 16 subject-specific Summer Schools and Winter Schools covering a wide range of academic fields. Around 1000 students from nearly 90 countries joined MISU short-term programs in 2019. Germany has
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#17327732242666500-681: The Ludwigsvorstadt (Klinikum Innenstadt) and in the Lehel ( Institut am Englischen Garten ), across from the main buildings, through the Englischer Garten . The university's main building is situated in Geschwister-Scholl-Platz and the university's main campus is served by the Munich subway 's Universität station. The große Aula is located in the university main building at Ludwigstraße in Munich. The Aula
6625-526: The Nobel Prize in Chemistry by Bernhard Naunyn , Goldschmidt and Planck. As a young graduate student at the University of California at Berkeley in the mid-1930s and in connection with our work with plutonium a few years later, I used his book Applied Radiochemistry as my bible. This book was based on a series of lectures which Professor Hahn had given at Cornell in 1933; it set forth the "laws" for
6750-559: The Summer University allows the LMU Munich to intensify cooperation with international partner universities. MISU's short-term programs therefore strengthen the LMU's international visibility as one of the highest ranked universities in Europe. The alumni of Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich played a major role in the development of quantum mechanics . Max Planck , the founder of quantum theory and Nobel laureate in Physics in 1918,
6875-483: The United States and Canada as a visiting professor at Cornell University. He gave an interview to the Toronto Star Weekly in which he painted a flattering portrait of Adolf Hitler : I am not a Nazi. But Hitler is the hope, the powerful hope, of German youth... At least 20 million people revere him. He began as a nobody, and you see what he has become in ten years.… In any case for the youth, for
7000-450: The advantage for international students to receive a very intensive and concise insight into the research areas and campus at the LMU Munich. MISU hereby has the objective to combine excellent academic education with extra-curricular activities. Participants are thus not only supervised intensively by established researchers on selected topics but are also introduced to the history, culture and politics of Munich, Bavaria and Germany. Moreover,
7125-544: The basement of the Chemical Institute at the University of Berlin as a laboratory. Hahn completed his habilitation in early 1907 and became a Privatdozent . In 1912, he became head of the Radioactivity Department of the newly founded Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Chemistry (KWIC). Working with the Austrian physicist Lise Meitner in the building that now bears their names, they made a series of groundbreaking discoveries, culminating with her isolation of
7250-672: The board of trustees of the Max Planck Institute for Neurobiology and the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry . Müller graduated as a PhD in philosophy at the University of Munich in 1982, after which he worked as a research student and subsequently as a program director at the Max Planck Society from 1982 until 1989, then was the director of the European Center for International Security EUCIS (a small non-governmental organization which he founded himself) from 1989 until 1995, according to some sources. Müller
7375-506: The department heads that Hahn had dismissed, who was now working in England. Ernst Telschow [ de ] , a Nazi Party member, was in charge while Planck, the president of the KWS since 1930, was on vacation, and he ordered the shipment halted. Hahn complied, but he disgreed with the decision on the grounds that funds from aboard should not be diverted to military research, which the KWS
7500-647: The director in 1928. Meitner became the director of the Physical Radioactivity Division, while Hahn headed the Chemical Radioactivity Division. In the early 1920s, Hahn created a new line of research. Using the "emanation method", which he had recently developed, and the "emanation ability", he founded what became known as "applied radiochemistry" for the researching of general chemical and physical-chemical questions. In 1936 Cornell University Press published
7625-530: The entire volume repeatedly and I recall that my chief disappointment with it was its length. It was too short. Glenn Seaborg, In 1924, Hahn was elected to full membership of the Prussian Academy of Sciences in Berlin, by a vote of thirty white balls to two black. While still remaining the head of his own department, he became Deputy Director of the KWIC in 1924, and succeeded Alfred Stock as
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#17327732242667750-549: The faculties and the missing numbers 06 and 14 are the result of breakups and mergers of faculties in the past. The Faculty of Forestry Operations with number 06 has been integrated into the Technical University of Munich in 1999 and faculty number 14 has been merged with faculty number 13. In addition to its 18 faculties, the University of Munich also maintains numerous research centres involved in numerous cross-faculty and transdisciplinary projects to complement its various academic programmes. Some of these research centres were
7875-513: The father of nuclear chemistry, which emerged from applied radiochemistry. Fritz Strassmann had come to the KWIC to study under Hahn to improve his employment prospects. After the Nazi Party (NSDAP) came to power in Germany in 1933, Strassmann declined a lucrative offer of employment because it required political training and Nazi Party membership. Later, rather than become a member of a Nazi-controlled organisation, Strassmann resigned from
8000-539: The female proportion of students at LMU had reached 18%. In 1918, Adele Hartmann became the first woman in Germany to earn the Habilitation (higher doctorate), at LMU. During the Weimar Republic , the university continued to be one of the world's leading universities, with professors such as Wilhelm Röntgen , Wilhelm Wien , Richard Willstätter , Arnold Sommerfeld and Ferdinand Sauerbruch . During
8125-451: The first report on his discovery. Hahn determined that uranium Z had a half-life of around 6.7 hours (with a two per cent margin of error) and that when uranium X1 decayed, it became uranium X2 about 99.75 per cent of the time, and uranium Z around 0.25 per cent of the time. He found that the proportion of uranium X to uranium Z extracted from several kilograms of uranyl nitrate remained constant over time, strongly indicating that uranium X
8250-572: The gas again blew back on German lines, and Hertz was poisoned. This assignment was interrupted by a mission at the front in Flanders and again in 1916 by a mission to Verdun to introduce shells filled with phosgene to the Western Front . Then once again he was hunting along both fronts for sites for gas attacks. In December 1916 he joined the new gas command unit at Imperial Headquarters. Between operations, Hahn returned to Berlin, where he
8375-744: The isolation of the new isotope. The work was interrupted by the First World War . Meitner became an X-ray nurse, working in Austrian Army hospitals, but she returned to the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in October 1916. Hahn joined the new gas command unit at Imperial Headquarters in Berlin in December 1916 after travelling between the western and eastern front, Berlin and Leverkusen between mid-1914 and late 1916. Most of
8500-565: The leading expert on the field, Ernest Rutherford . Rutherford agreed to take Hahn on as an assistant, and Hahn's parents undertook to pay Hahn's expenses. From September 1905 until mid-1906, Hahn worked with Rutherford's group in the basement of the Macdonald Physics Building at McGill University in Montreal. There was some scepticism about the existence of radiothorium, which Bertram Boltwood memorably described as
8625-444: The leading universities of West Germany during the Cold War and in the post-reunification era. In the late 1960s, the university was the scene of protests by radical students. Today, the University of Munich is part of 24 Collaborative Research Centers funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) and is host university of 13 of them. It also hosts 12 DFG Research Training Groups and three international doctorate programs as part of
8750-429: The letter of the convention by releasing gas from cylinders instead of shells. Haber's new unit was called Pioneer Regiment 35. After brief training in Berlin, Hahn, together with physicists James Franck and Gustav Hertz, was sent to Flanders again to scout for a site for a first gas attack . He did not witness the attack because he and Franck were off selecting a position for the next attack. Transferred to Poland, at
8875-486: The longest-lived isotope of protactinium in 1918. During World War I he served with a Landwehr regiment on the Western Front , and with the chemical warfare unit headed by Fritz Haber on the Western, Eastern and Italian fronts, earning the Iron Cross (2nd Class) for his part in the First Battle of Ypres . After the war he became the head of the KWIC, while remaining in charge of his own department. Between 1934 and 1938, he worked with Strassmann and Meitner on
9000-909: The mesothorium process, of which he gave 10 per cent to Meitner. The new institute was inaugurated on 23 October 1912 in a ceremony presided over by Kaiser Wilhelm II . The Kaiser was shown glowing radioactive substances in a dark room. The move to new accommodation was fortuitous, as the wood shop had become heavily contaminated by radioactive liquids that had been spilt, and radioactive gases that had vented and then decayed and settled as radioactive dust, making sensitive measurements impossible. To ensure that their clean new laboratories stayed that way, Hahn and Meitner instituted strict procedures. Chemical and physical measurements were conducted in different rooms, people handling radioactive substances had to follow protocols that included not shaking hands, and rolls of toilet paper were hung next to every telephone and door handle. Strongly radioactive substances were stored in
9125-417: The mineral. In 1937, Strassmann and Ernst Walling extracted 253.4 milligrams of strontium carbonate from 1,012 grams of the mineral, all of which was the strontium-87 isotope, indicating that it had all been produced from radioactive decay of rubidium-87. The age of the mineral had been estimated at 1,975 million years from uranium minerals in the same deposit, which implied that the half-life of rubidium-87
9250-701: The moment when a radioactinium (thorium-227) atom emits an alpha particle, it does so with great force, and the actinium X experiences a recoil. This is enough to free it from chemical bonds, and it has a positive charge, and can be collected at a negative electrode. Hahn was thinking only of actinium, but on reading his paper, Meitner told him that he had found a new way of detecting radioactive substances. They set up some tests, and soon found actinium C ' ' (thallium-207) and thorium C ' ' (thallium-208). The physicist Walther Gerlach described radioactive recoil as "a profoundly significant discovery in physics with far-reaching consequences". In 1910, Hahn
9375-537: The most original of recent contributions to scientific literature. Hahn published his results in the Proceedings of the Royal Society on 24 May 1905. It was the first of more than 250 scientific publications in the field of radiochemistry. At the end of his time in London, Ramsay asked Hahn about his plans for the future, and Hahn told him about the job offer from Kalle & Co. Ramsay told him radiochemistry had
9500-488: The name. The connection to uranium remained a mystery, as neither of the known isotopes of uranium decayed into protactinium. It remained unsolved until the mother isotope, uranium-235 , was discovered in 1929. For their discovery Hahn and Meitner were repeatedly nominated for the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in the 1920s by several scientists, among them Max Planck, Heinrich Goldschmidt , and Fajans himself. In 1949,
9625-557: The nation of the future, Hitler is a hero, a Führer, a saint... In his daily life he is almost a saint. No alcohol, not even tobacco, no meat, no women. In a word: Hitler is an unequivocal Christ. The April 1933 Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service banned Jews and communists from academia. Meitner was exempt from its impact because she was an Austrian rather than a German citizen. Haber
9750-430: The neutron emissions ceased. Not only had they discovered a new form of radioactive decay, they had transmuted an element into a hitherto unknown radioactive isotope of another, thereby inducing radioactivity where there had been none before. Radiochemistry was now no longer confined to certain heavy elements, but extended to the entire periodic table. Chadwick noted that being electrically neutral, neutrons could penetrate
9875-407: The next generation of scholars, clusters of excellence to promote cutting-edge research, and "future concepts" for the project-based expansion of academic excellence at universities as a whole. In order to qualify for this third area, a university had to have at least one internationally recognized academic center of excellence and a new graduate school. After the first round of selections, LMU Munich
10000-487: The nucleus.") With the Anschluss , Germany's annexation of Austria on 12 March 1938, Meitner lost her Austrian citizenship, and fled to Sweden. She carried only a little money, but before she left, Hahn gave her a diamond ring he had inherited from his mother. Meitner continued to correspond with Hahn by mail. In late 1938 Hahn and Strassmann found evidence of isotopes of an alkaline earth metal in their sample. Finding
10125-459: The number of courses has increased and the range of subject-specific Summer Schools was extended to further academic disciplines. From 2008 onwards LMU's Summer University operates under the name Munich International Summer University (MISU). A central aim of MISU is to boost the internationality of the LMU Munich in terms of research and teaching. Compared to semester-based student exchange programs , short-term programs such as Summer Schools have
10250-531: The old wood shop, and later in a purpose-built radium house on the institute grounds. In July 1914—shortly before the outbreak of World War I —Hahn was recalled to active duty with the army in a Landwehr regiment. They marched through Belgium, where the platoon he commanded was armed with captured machine guns. He was awarded the Iron Cross (2nd Class) for his part in the First Battle of Ypres . He
10375-528: The period of German humanism , the university's academics included names such as Conrad Celtes and Petrus Apianus . The theologian Johann Eck also taught at the university. From 1549 to 1773, the university was influenced by the Jesuits and became one of the centres of the Counter-Reformation . The Jesuit Petrus Canisius served as rector of the university. At the end of the 18th century,
10500-513: The presence of multiple isotopes of at least four such elements, and (mistakenly) identified them as elements with atomic numbers 93 through 96. They were the first scientists to measure the 23-minute half-life of uranium-239 and to establish chemically that it was an isotope of uranium, but were unable to continue this work to its logical conclusion and identify the real element 93. They identified ten different half-lives, with varying degrees of certainty. To account for them, Meitner had to hypothesise
10625-441: The process, he found that a precipitation of thorium A ( polonium -216) and thorium B (lead-212) also contained a short-lived "element", which he named thorium C (which was later identified as polonium-212). Hahn was unable to separate it, and concluded that it had a very short half-life (it is about 300 ns). He also identified radioactinium (thorium-227) and radium D (later identified as lead-210). Rutherford remarked that: "Hahn has
10750-399: The reactions were from different isotopes of uranium; three were known: uranium-238, uranium-235 and uranium-234. However, when she calculated the neutron cross section , it was too large to be anything other than the most abundant isotope, uranium-238. She concluded that it must be another case of the nuclear isomerism that Hahn had discovered in protactinium. She therefore ended her report on
10875-406: The remaining rubidium, he could measure the age of the mineral, assuming that his original calculation of the half-life was reasonably accurate. This would be a superior dating method to studying the decay of uranium, because some of the uranium turns into helium, which then escapes, resulting in rocks appearing to be younger than they really were. Jacob Papish helped Hahn obtain several kilograms of
11000-479: The research centres which have been established include: Universities in Bavaria do not charge tuition fees. Instead, a mandatory semester fee has to be paid that is fully transferred to the student union for providing, amongst other services, housing and lunch options for students. The 2025 QS World University Rankings rank LMU Munich 59th overall in the world and 2nd in Germany. In the 2024 QS Subject Rankings,
11125-518: The scientific paper Physikalischen Zeitschrift under the title Die Muttersubstanz des Actiniums; Ein Neues Radioaktives Element von Langer Lebensdauer ("The Mother Substance of Actinium; A New Radioactive Element with a Long Lifetime"). Although Fajans and Göhring had been the first to discover the element, custom required that an element was represented by its longest-lived and most abundant isotope, and while brevium had
11250-457: The scientific papers will be agog with a new discovery which has been added to the many brilliant triumphs of Gower Street. Dr. Otto Hahn, who is working at University College, has discovered a new radioactive element, extracted from a mineral from Ceylon, named Thorianite, and possibly, it is conjectured, the substance which renders thorium radioactive. Its activity is at least 250,000 times as great as that of thorium, weight for weight. It gives off
11375-449: The sleeves of his suit. It was not possible to conduct research in the wood shop, but Alfred Stock , the head of the inorganic chemistry department, let Hahn use a space in one of his two private laboratories. Hahn purchased two milligrams of radium from Friedrich Oskar Giesel , the discoverer of emanium (radon), for 100 marks a milligram (equivalent to €700 in 2021), and obtained thorium for free from Otto Knöfler, whose Berlin firm
11500-664: The state of Bavaria , where the current Bavarian constitution was enacted. Today, the Aula hosts mainly concerts, talks and lectures. Despite the Bologna Process which saw the demise of most traditional academic-degree courses such as the Diplom and Magister Artium in favour of the more internationally known Bachelors and Masters system, the University of Munich continues to offer more than 100 areas of study with numerous combinations of majors and minors. In line with
11625-846: The student population. As for the operating budget, the university records in 2022 a total of 797.4 million euros in funding without the university hospital; with the university hospital, the university has a total funding amounting to approximately 2.18 billion euros. As of 2023, the University of Munich is associated with 44 Nobel laureates . Among these were Wilhelm Röntgen , Max Planck , Werner Heisenberg , Otto Hahn and Thomas Mann . Notable alumni, faculty and researchers include Pope Benedict XVI , Rudolf Peierls , Josef Mengele , Richard Strauss , Walter Benjamin , Joseph Campbell , Muhammad Iqbal , Marie Stopes , Wolfgang Pauli , Bertolt Brecht , Max Horkheimer , Karl Loewenstein , Carl Schmitt , Gustav Radbruch , Ernst Cassirer , Ernst Bloch and Konrad Adenauer . LMU has recently been conferred
11750-455: The students, laboratory assistants and technicians had been called up, so Hahn, who was stationed in Berlin between January and September 1917, and Meitner had to do everything themselves. By December 1917 she was able to isolate the substance, and after further work were able to prove that it was indeed the missing isotope. Meitner submitted her and Hahn's findings for publication in March 1918 to
11875-464: The study of isotopes created by neutron bombardment of uranium and thorium, which led to the discovery of nuclear fission. He was an opponent of national socialism and the persecution of Jews by the Nazi Party that caused the removal of many of his colleagues, including Meitner, who was forced to flee Germany in 1938. During World War II , he worked on the German nuclear weapons program , cataloguing
12000-550: The term, was coined in 1913 by the British chemist Frederick Soddy . Ramsay was enthusiastic when yet another new element was found in his institute, and he intended to announce the discovery in a correspondingly suitable way. In accordance with tradition this was done before the committee of the venerable Royal Society . At the session of the Royal Society on 16 March 1905 Ramsay communicated Hahn's discovery of radiothorium. The Daily Telegraph informed its readers: Very soon
12125-661: The theory of thinking at the MCA program of the international school for advanced studies in Trieste, SISSA His main fields of interest are the concept of time and the theory of thinking, and in these fields he has made various publications. Müller is also an external contributor to programs of the Human Science Center and the Munich Center of Neuroscience at the Ludwig Maximilian University. Furthermore, he serves on
12250-545: The title of "University of Excellence" under the German Universities Excellence Initiative , and is a member of U15 as well as the LERU . The university was founded with papal approval in 1472 as the University of Ingolstadt (foundation right of Louis IX the Rich ), with faculties of philosophy, medicine, jurisprudence and theology. Its first rector was Christopher Mendel of Steinfels , who later became bishop of Chiemsee . In
12375-423: The university is highly ranked in the arts and humanities, natural sciences, and life sciences and medicine. The Times Higher Education Ranking 2024 ranks LMU Munich 2nd in Germany, and 38th in the world. In the 2023 THE subject rankings, LMU is ranked first in Germany in the arts and humanities, law, and psychology. The Academic Ranking of World Universities ranks LMU Munich joint 2nd nationally and 59th in
12500-774: The university was influenced by the Enlightenment , which led to a stronger emphasis on natural science . In 1800, the Prince-Elector Maximilian IV Joseph (the later Maximilian I, King of Bavaria ) moved the university to Landshut , due to French aggression that threatened Ingolstadt during the Napoleonic Wars . In 1802, the university was renamed the Ludwig Maximilian University in honour of its two founders, Louis IX, Duke of Bavaria and Maximilian I, Elector of Bavaria . The Minister of Education, Maximilian von Montgelas , initiated
12625-419: The university was officially named Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität by King Maximilian I of Bavaria in honor of himself and Ludwig IX. LMU is currently the second-largest university in Germany in terms of student population; in the 2023/24 winter semester, the university had a total of 52,972 matriculated students. Of these, 10,138 were freshmen, while international students totaled 2,859 or approximately 28% of
12750-621: The university's internationalisation as a popular destination for tertiary studies, an increasing number of courses mainly at the graduate and post-graduate levels are also available in English to cater to international students who may have little or no background in the German language. Some notable subject areas which currently offer programmes in English include various fields of psychology , physics as well as business and management. The university consists of 18 faculties which oversee various departments and institutes. The official numbering of
12875-846: The university. In the beginning of 2020, the LMU locked around 80 students in a room who wanted to discuss the topic "Climate Burns, University Burns," about why universities are doing research for companies that are harmful to the climate . LMU's institutes and research centers are spread throughout Munich, with several buildings located in the suburbs of Oberschleissheim and Garching as well as Maisach and Bad Tölz . The university's main buildings are grouped around Geschwister-Scholl-Platz and Professor-Huber-Platz on Ludwigstrasse , extending into side streets such as Akademiestraße, Schellingstraße, and Veterinärstraße. Other large campuses and institutes are located in Großhadern ( Klinikum Großhadern ), Martinsried (chemistry and biotechnology campus),
13000-431: The way, Hahn determined that just as he was unable to separate thorium from radiothorium, so he could not separate mesothorium I from radium. In Canada there had been no requirement to be circumspect when addressing the egalitarian New Zealander Rutherford, but many people in Germany found his manner off-putting, and characterised him as an "Anglicised Berliner". Hahn completed his habilitation in early 1907, and became
13125-549: The world as of 2023. In the subjects of physics, education, communication, public administration, and hospitality, it is ranked first in Germany. In 2018 and 2019, the LMU took 1st place based on the number of DAX board of management members. The top 3 universities in 2019 were the LMU Munich, the RWTH Aachen and the Technische Universität Darmstadt . According to the funding report of
13250-476: Was 2.3 x 10 years: quite close to Hahn's original calculation. Rubidium–strontium dating became a widely used technique for dating rocks in the 1950s, when mass spectrometry became common. After James Chadwick discovered the neutron in 1932, Irène Curie and Frédéric Joliot irradiated aluminium foil with alpha particles. They found that this results in a short-lived radioactive isotope of phosphorus . They noted that positron emission continued after
13375-588: Was a German chemist who was a pioneer in the fields of radioactivity and radiochemistry . He is referred to as the father of nuclear chemistry and discoverer of nuclear fission , the science behind nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons . Hahn and Lise Meitner discovered isotopes of the radioactive elements radium , thorium , protactinium and uranium . He also discovered the phenomena of atomic recoil and nuclear isomerism , and pioneered rubidium–strontium dating . In 1938, Hahn, Meitner and Fritz Strassmann discovered nuclear fission , for which Hahn alone
13500-593: Was a joyful participant in the Christmas truce of 1914, and was commissioned as a lieutenant. In mid-January 1915, he was summoned to meet chemist Fritz Haber , who explained his plan to break the trench deadlock with chlorine gas . Hahn raised the issue that the Hague Convention banned the use of projectiles containing poison gases, but Haber explained that the French had already initiated chemical warfare with tear gas grenades, and he planned to get around
13625-503: Was a major producer of thorium products. In the space of a few months Hahn discovered mesothorium I (radium-228), mesothorium II (actinium-228), and – independently from Boltwood – the mother substance of radium, ionium (later identified as thorium-230 ). In subsequent years, mesothorium I assumed great importance because, like radium-226 (discovered by Pierre and Marie Curie ), it was ideally suited for use in medical radiation treatment, but cost only half as much to manufacture. Along
13750-505: Was able to slip back to his old laboratory and work with Meitner, continuing with their research. In September 1917 he was one of three officers, disguised in Austrian uniforms, sent to the Isonzo front in Italy to find a suitable location for an attack, using newly developed rifled minenwerfers that simultaneously hurled hundreds of containers of poison gas onto enemy targets. They selected
13875-425: Was allowed to work in the wood shop, which had its own external entrance, but could not enter the rest of the institute, including Hahn's laboratory space upstairs. If she wanted to go to the toilet, she had to use one at the restaurant down the street. The following year, women were admitted to universities, and Fischer lifted the restrictions and had women's toilets installed in the building. Harriet Brooks observed
14000-630: Was an alumnus of the university. Founders of quantum mechanics such as Werner Heisenberg , Wolfgang Pauli , and others were associated with the university. Most recently, to honor the Nobel laureate in Chemistry Gerhard Ertl , who worked as a professor at the University of Munich from 1973 to 1986, the building of the Physical Chemistry was named after him. Pakistani philosopher and poet Sir Muhammad Iqbal , regarded as
14125-415: Was an isotope of the missing element, which they named "brevium" after its short half life. However, it was a beta emitter, and therefore could not be the mother isotope of actinium. This had to be another isotope of the same element. Hahn and Meitner set out to find the missing mother isotope. They developed a new technique for separating the tantalum group from pitchblende , which they hoped would speed
14250-787: Was appointed professor by the Prussian Minister of Culture and Education, August von Trott zu Solz . Two years later, Hahn became head of the Radioactivity Department of the newly founded Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Chemistry (KWIC) in Berlin-Dahlem (in what is today the Hahn-Meitner-Building of the Free University of Berlin ). This came with an annual salary of 5,000 marks (equivalent to €29,000 in 2021). In addition, he received 66,000 marks in 1914 (equivalent to €369,000 in 2021) from Knöfler for
14375-411: Was awarded the 1944 Nobel Prize in Chemistry . A graduate of the University of Marburg , which awarded him a doctorate in 1901, Hahn studied under Sir William Ramsay at University College London and at McGill University in Montreal under Ernest Rutherford , where he discovered several new radioactive isotopes. He returned to Germany in 1906; Emil Fischer let him use a former woodworking shop in
14500-410: Was constructed as part of the main building by Friedrich von Gärtner and completed in 1840. The hall is situated in the first floor and extends to the second floor. The Aula was not destroyed during World War II and, thus, is one of few usable pre war venues in Munich . The Aula was used for the first performances of concerts after the war. Furthermore, it was venue for the constituent assembly of
14625-578: Was his wish that it be distributed to the dismissed staff to facilitate their emigration. Hahn brokered a deal whereby 10 per cent of the funds would be allocated to Haber's people and the rest to KWS, but the Rockefeller Foundation insisted that the funds be used for their original scientific research or else be returned. In August 1933 the administrators of the KWS were alerted that several boxes of Rockefeller Foundation-funded equipment were about to be shipped to Herbert Freundlich , one of
14750-408: Was increasingly undertaking. When Planck returned from vacation, he ordered Hahn to expedite the shipment. Haber died on 29 January 1934. A memorial service was held on the first anniversary of his death. University professors were forbidden to attend, so they sent their wives in their place. Hahn, Planck and Joseph Koeth attended, and gave speeches. The aging Planck did not seek re-election, and
14875-663: Was invited to submit applications for all three funding lines. It entered the competition with proposals for two graduate schools and four clusters of excellence. On Friday 13 October 2006, a blue-ribbon panel announced the results of the Germany-wide Excellence Initiative for promoting top university research and education. The panel, composed of the German Research Foundation and the German Science Council, has decided that LMU Munich will receive funding for all three areas covered by
15000-423: Was known for having discovered the noble gases . Here Hahn worked on radiochemistry , at that time a very new field. In early 1905, in the course of his work with salts of radium , Hahn discovered a new substance he called radiothorium (thorium-228), which at that time was believed to be a new radioactive element. In fact, it was an isotope of the known element thorium ; the concept of an isotope, along with
15125-467: Was likewise exempt as a veteran of World War I, but chose to resign his directorship of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Physical Chemistry and Electrochemistry in protest on 30 April 1933. The directors of the other Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes, even the Jewish ones, complied with the new law, which applied to the KWS as a whole and those Kaiser Wilhelm institutes with more than 50% state support, which exempted
15250-485: Was still to work in industry. He received an offer of employment from Eugen Fischer, the director of Kalle & Co. [ de ] (and the father of organic chemist Hans Fischer ), but a condition of employment was that Hahn had to have lived in another country and have a reasonable command of another language. With this in mind, and to improve his knowledge of English, Hahn took up a post at University College London in 1904, working under Sir William Ramsay , who
15375-537: Was succeeded in 1937 as president by Carl Bosch , a winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry and the chairman of the board of IG Farben , a company which had bankrolled the Nazi Party since 1932. Telschow became Secretary of the KWS. He was an enthusiastic supporter of the Nazis, but was also loyal to Hahn, being one of his former students, and Hahn welcomed his appointment. Hahn's chief assistant, Otto Erbacher, became
15500-412: Was the first example of nuclear isomerism . Walther Gerlach later remarked that this was "a discovery that was not understood at the time but later became highly significant for nuclear physics". Not until 1936 was Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker able to provide a theoretical explanation of the phenomenon. For this discovery, whose full significance was recognised by very few, Hahn was again proposed for
15625-542: Was the mother of uranium Z. To prove this, Hahn obtained a hundred kilograms of uranyl nitrate; separating the uranium X from it took weeks. He found that the half-life of the parent of uranium Z differed from the known 24-day half-life of uranium X1 by no more than two or three days, but was unable to get a more accurate value. Hahn concluded that uranium Z and uranium X2 were both the same isotope of protactinium ( protactinium-234 ), and they both decayed into uranium II ( uranium-234 ), but with different half-lives. Uranium Z
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