History of Atom

History of Atom Through Postage Stamps

Commentary:The present educational collage shows the history of atoms through postage stams.German physicist named Max Planck (1858-1947) , proposed that energy behaved according to the equation E = hν , indicated birth of the quantum era. Einstein was able to use the idea of quantized energy to Photoelectric Effect .Max planck stamps and Einstein stamp shown in collage was issued in their honor when they received their Nobel Prize for their findings. Ernest Rutherford, gave basic idea of an atom and advanced it with his “planetary model”. Bohr suggested that the electrons circling atoms traveled in “well-defined circular orbits”. The stamp honoring Bohr shows his signature.Louis de Broglie had proposed a theory whereby any particle exhibits wavelike properties no matter what its size. The de Broglie stamp shows a wave for his de Broglie wavelengths overlaid with amplitude graphs showing where the particle is likely to be found. Nobel Prize winner of Physics (1932) Werner Heisenberg (1901-1976) put forward one of the first ideas of quantum mechanics, the Uncertainty Principle. This collage includes stamp of Werner Heisenberg and illustrates a molecular structure honoring his theory helping to explain the structure of atoms and molecules.

Austria, Erwin Schrödinger (1887-1961)nobel prize winner(1933), model replaced Bohr’s “Well-Defined Circular Orbits” with the idea of an orbital. This became Schrödinger’s wave equation. The stamp for Schrödinger shows wave functions for two different electron orbitals representing the electron density predicted by his wave equation.

Message of collage :Importance of postage stamps in scientific development cannot be denied. From the time of the ancient Greeks until today, the visual concept of the atom is obscure, yet the mathematical concepts have grown stronger. The present collage shows development of models of atoms through postage stamps. It starts with findings of Max Planck and ends at Schrödinger’s wave equation.