Biographical Memoirs Volume 54 (1983) / Chapter Skim
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Jesse Wakefield Beams
Jesse Wakefield Beams
Pages 2-49
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Their impact on science and technology has been enormous. EARLY LIFE IN KANSAS Jesse Beams was born on a farm in Sumner County, Kansas on Christmas Day IS98.
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Those who seek a genetic or social basis for outstanding achievements and academic excellence may wonder why the two children of the seconct family of Jesse Beams, Sr., reared on the same farm, grew up to be distinguished scientists ant! professors whereas none of the children of the first family, so far as T couIct learn, became known scholars or scientists; apparently, they follower!
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Second in importance to the centrifuge in Jesse's physical experiments were those designed to gain information about electrical discharges, including lightning itself. While it is easy to connect Jesse Beams's remarkable experiments in physics with his early experiences on the Kansas farm, there were thousands of children brought up on farms of the western plains who uncloubtecIly participated in the same farm operations, who saw over and over again the manifestations of the same natural phenomena without being so motivated to explore them.
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The thesis project that Professor Sparrow assigned to Jesse may have been as exciting to him as lightning over the Kansas farm. Sparrow proposed that he measure the time interval between the arrival of the quantum and the ejection of the electron in the photoelectric effect.
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thesis: measurement of the time interval between the light quantum and the ejection of the electron in the photoelectric effect. By this time, physicists, including
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RETURN TO VIRGINIA After the expiration of his National Research Fellowship and a year spent as an instructor at Yale, Jesse Beams returned to the UniversitY of Virginia in the fall of 1928 as an assocla~e processor or physics. 1 nls appointment proved to be :~ rid ~_1 ~ /.1 · · .
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As future events proved, he coup not have clone better than to attract young Beams back to his alma mater, even at a tworank promotion over his Yale instructorship. In his history of the Physics Department of the University of Virginia, F
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10 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRS Board, apparently with an agreement that the State of Virginia would contribute enough to maintain the fund at a level of $45,000 a year, of which the physics (department was to receive a maximum of $1 1,670.3 Although paltry indeed in comparison with present levels of support for physics research, these funds in support of the ingenious experiments of Jesse Beams had an enormous impact on the development of science in this country. What influence Jesse's return had on these encouraging clevelopments in the physics program at Virginia I clo not know, but ~ suspect it was considerable.
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This does not mean that his programs lacked breadth and diversity far from it. Under his continuous cultivation the centrifuge became a family of instruments capable of solving a variety of basic problems in chemistry and biology as well as in physics; it had many important technological or inclustrial applications, from testing the strength of materials to the separation of uranium isotopes for nuclear energy.
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With this innovation, do Laval constructed a small steam turbine capable of turning at seven hundred rotations a second. Between 1920 and 1925, Theodor Sveciberg, at the University of Uppsala, with meticulous design and exceptional workmanship, constructed small centrifuges mounted on nonflexible shafts, which achieved rotational speeds of the order of a thousand rotations a second.
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The principal deterrent is the frictional resistance of the air. This brief summary brings the history of the centrifuge to the time when Jesse Beams became involvec} with its development and applications.
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The flexible shaft coup shift its position slightly, thus allowing the rotor to spin about its own inertial axis, as in the system of cle Laval. Because of the externally rotating parts, this mode!
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This ferromagnetic rotor wouIct seek the region of strongest field, that in line with the magnet's core, and, when spinning freely, would also seek to rotate about its own inertial axis of symmetry. Consequently, Jesse cleverly hung the cylindrical core of the external electromagnet by a flexible wire in a loose-fitting oil container so that the spinning ferromagnetic rotor could pull the axis of the supporting magnetic field exactly into line with its own axis of rotation.
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A servomechanism connected to the loop sent a correcting signal to the electromagnet. With the rotor thus stably suspended entirely by externally applied fields in its closed, evacuated container, the only remaining problem, that of finding a satisfactory method of spinning the rotor without introducing the mechanical driving shaft, was solved elegantly when Beams and his associates constructed the rotor in such a way that it could be driven by electromagnetic induction fields produced by "field" coils outside the container.
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The centrifugal fields of the Beams ultracentrifuge proved to be sufficiently large to produce sedimentation in all known substances in either the gaseous phase or in liquic! solution.
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GAS CENTRIFUGE CONCENTRATION OF ATOMIC ISOTOPES. ESPECIALLY THOSE OF URANIUM The Beams contribution that is likely to have an enormous eventual impact on the industry and the economy of this and other nations is his pioneering use of the ultracentrifuge for separation of atomic isotopes, especially those of uranium.
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from the Carnegie Institution of Washington and later, in 11940 and 1941, grants totaling $6,353.57 from the Naval Research Laboratory. With this modest support, in 1941 Beams and his group succeeded in making the first separation of uranium isotopes with the gas centrifuge.
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Consequently, support of the gas centrifuge project was terminated in January 1944. During the following decade, work on the project was dormant, according to Beams, primarily because of strict security cIassif~cation.
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In April 1977, three months before [esse's cleath, President Carter authorized the conversion to the gas centrifuge process of a large-scale plant at Portsmouth, Ohio, originally planned in the mid 1970s as an expansion of the gaseous diffusion facility. This first large-scale gas centrifuge separation plant in the United States is uncler construction at the time of this writing ~ ~ 9801.
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R Vanstrom, vice-presiclent for engineering and clevelopment of Union Carbide Corporation, the gas centrifuge plant being constructed at Portsmouth will require about 145 MW of power, whereas the same capacity provided by the gaseous diffusion process would require about 2700 MW, almost twenty times that required for the gas centrifuge process.
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Two much heavier spherical masses were then placed on opposite sides of the two suspended balls so that the gravitational attraction between the fixed and suspended masses produced a twisting torque on the fiber. With the measured angle of twist, the torsional constant of the fiber, and the separation of the centers of the spheres, the gravitational constant could be calculated from Newton's gravitational formula.
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Likewise, an observer off the rotating table sees the two inertial systems on the table as turning together at a slowly increasing velocity, the rate of increase of which is cleterminecl by gravitational attraction between the two systems. The Beams method has two important advantages that make it potentially orders of magnitude more accurate than previous methods for measurement of G
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G Luther et al., "Initial Results from a New Measurement of the Newtonian Gravitational Constant," in Atomic Masses and Fundamental Constants, vol.
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A NEW INSTRUMENT FOR BIOPHYSICAL STUDIES The many applications of the Beams ultracentrifuge for isolation and molecular weight measurement of large molecuTes of biological significance are widely known and have been mentioned earlier in this biography. Less known is the powerful new instrument for studies of the interactions of such molecules that Beams invented in the later years of his life.
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eviclently Jesse signed the accompanying letter contributing it to the AcademyProceedings, for it appears in the October issue for 1977 with the statement, "Contributed by Jesse W Beams." PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES AND PERSONAL ATTITUDES Jesse Beams was a respected leacler in professional societies devotect to the advancement of science.
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He was one of the organizers of the Southeastern Section of the American Physical Society and served as its first chairman (19371. In 1973 the Southeastern Section established the Jesse Wakefield
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It is evident that the University of Virginia recognized Jesse Wakefield Beams as one of the greatest professors in the long history of the University. He was elected!
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I couldn't resist adding"in the true Oxford-Cambridge manner? " In his personal relationships Jesse Beams maintained the same high stanciarcTs that he did in his laboratory experiments.
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These are his words: Anyone who knew Jesse Beams even slightly would agree that his first concern was for others. This concern was genuine; invariably, he would stop his work, listen attentively without interruption or haste, and be suppori~ve to any who came to him—whether they were of high rank or of no rank at all.
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Once there, he wanted to buy two or three suits so that he would not have to come again soon. Even more difficult for Maxine than buying Jesse's clothes or taking care of business matters was inducing him to stop work long enough to get adequate relaxation.
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When ~ asked for her comments about her life with Jesse, she saicI: "less was the most (delightful, kincI, (devoted person in the world, and ~ was so lucky to have been given the wonderful privilege of sharing his fascinating, interesting life for forty-six years. Ancl those two years of waiting around to decide, them too, I count in the total for forty-eight—forty-eight wonderful, calm, peaceful, devoted years, filled with excitement and the unexpected but always with love and devotion." A single-sentence remark made to me by President Hereford summarizes this memoir, "Jesse Beams was the ultimate gentleman scholar." MANY INDIVIDUALS have provided information used in this memoir.
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Paul R Vanstrum, vice-president for engineering and development of the Nuclear Division of Union Carbide, gave me much information about iesse's role in the development of the gas centrifuge process for concentration of uranium isotopes.
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American Optical Society American Physical Society (fellow; President, 1958) American Physical Society, Southeastern Section (first Chairman, 1937)
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Naval Ordnance Development Award John Scott Award, given by the City of Philadelphia Lewis Award, American Philosophical Society Alumni Achievement Award, Wichita State Uni versity 1963 Meritorious Award, Virginia Academy of Sciences 1967 National Medal of Science 1971 Life Fellow, The Franklin Institute 1972 Atomic Energy Committee Citation 1972 Distinguished Virginian Award 1972 Jesse W Beams Lectureship in Biophysics initiated at the University of Virginia Jesse W
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JESSE WAKEFIELD BEAMS HONORARY DEGREES 941 946 949 969 976 Sc.D., College of William and Mary Sc.D., University of North Carolina Sc.D., Washington and Lee University Sc.D., Florida Institute of Technology Sc.D., Yale University 37
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The time intervals between the appearance of certain spectrum lines of helium and mercury.
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A review of the use of Kerr cells for the measurement of time intervals and the production of flashes of light.
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The production of high rotational speeds.
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Frictional torque of an axial magnetic suspension. Nature, 140:3~31.
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The electrically driven, magnetically supported, vacuum type ultracentrifuge.
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Magnetically suspended, vacuum type ultracentrifuge.
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The magnetically suspended equilibrium ultracentrifuge.
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Magnetically suspended equilibrium ultracentrifuge.
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Magnetic suspension balance method for determining densities and partial specific volumes.
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37:3153-56. Speed control of magnetically suspended ultracentrifuge.
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The gravitational constant G In: Atomic Masses and Fundamental Constants, ed.
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USA, 72:3501-4. Early History of the Gas Centrifuge Work in the U.S.~.
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