Abstract
A FEATURE of the developments of electron theory dealt with by Mr. R. H. Fowler in the Supplement which we publish in this issue of NATURE is the extent to which older ideas have proved amenable to the requirements of quantum mechanics. The ‘electron cloud’, for example, has persisted, to provide, with certain modifications, the physical picture upon which most aspects of the theory are still developed, and the conception of a work-function for the passage of an electron through a surface has again emerged in the expressions for thermionic emission in a form little different, for practical purposes at least, from its original one. The amount of co-ordination and clarification of ideas effected by the quantum mechanics is nevertheless enormous, and it appears the more remarkable when the wide range of the electrical properties of metals to be explained is taken into account. Whilst there are still outstanding problems, notably in connexion with supra-conductivity and magnetic phenomena, as well, of course, as the fundamental ones referred to by Mr. Fowler at the end of his lecture, it will probably be generally admitted that his expectations are not unduly optimistic. Mr. Fowler has very modestly done less than justice to the importance of his personal contributions to the subject, which have been published in “Statistical Mechanics” and in numerous papers in the Proceedings of the Royal Society and the Proceedings of the Cambridge Philosophical Society.
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News and Views. Nature 126, 620–625 (1930). https://doi.org/10.1038/126620b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/126620b0