From cosmic ray physics to cosmic ray astronomy: Bruno Rossi and the opening of new windows on the universe |
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| Affiliation: | 1. Department of Astronomy, Wellesley College, Wellesley, MA 02481, United States;2. Department of Astronomy, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, United States;3. Department of Physics, University of Idaho, Moscow, ID 83844, United States;4. Space Science Institute, Austin, TX 78759, United States;5. Department of Physics, University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL 32816, United States;6. Department of Electrical Engineering, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA 95192, United States;7. JPL, Pasadena, CA 91109, United States;1. National Research Council, Institute of Methodologies for Environmental Analysis–C.da S.Loja, 85050 Tito, Italy;2. ARPAB - 85100, Potenza, Italy;3. Seismological Observatory, MTA CSFK GGI, Budapest, Hungary;1. Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, University of Mississippi, University, MS 38655-1848, USA;2. Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA;1. Institute for Experimental Physics, University of Hamburg, Luruper Chaussee 149, 22761 Hamburg, Germany;2. Skobeltsyn Institute for Nuclear Physics, Lomonosow Moscow State University, 1 Leninskie gory, 119991 Moscow, Russia;3. DESY, Platanenallee 6, 15378 Zeuthen, Germany;1. Department of Physics & Astronomy, Lehman College, City University of New York, NY 10468, USA;2. Department of Physics, Graduate Center, City University of New York, NY 10016, USA;3. Department of Astrophysics, American Museum of Natural History, NY 10024, USA;4. Department of Physics, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI 53706, USA;5. Department of Physics & Astronomy, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN 37235, USA |
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| Abstract: | Bruno Rossi is considered one of the fathers of modern physics, being also a pioneer in virtually every aspect of what is today called high-energy astrophysics. At the beginning of 1930s he was the pioneer of cosmic ray research in Italy, and, as one of the leading actors in the study of the nature and behavior of the cosmic radiation, he witnessed the birth of particle physics and was one of the main investigators in this fields for many years. While cosmic ray physics moved more and more towards astrophysics, Rossi continued to be one of the inspirers of this line of research. When outer space became a reality, he did not hesitate to leap into this new scientific dimension. Rossi’s intuition on the importance of exploiting new technological windows to look at the universe with new eyes, is a fundamental key to understand the profound unity which guided his scientific research path up to its culminating moments at the beginning of 1960s, when his group at MIT performed the first in situ measurements of the density, speed and direction of the solar wind at the boundary of Earth’s magnetosphere, and when he promoted the search for extra-solar sources of X rays. A visionary idea which eventually led to the breakthrough experiment which discovered Scorpius X-1 in 1962, and inaugurated X-ray astronomy. |
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| Keywords: | Cosmic rays Extensive air showers History of science Solar wind plasma X-ray astronomy |
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