Yoichiro Nambu was a Japanese-born
American physicist, a professor at the
University of Chicago. Known for his
contributions to the field of
theoretical physics, he was awarded half
of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2008
for the discovery in 1960 of the
mechanism of spontaneous broken symmetry
in subatomic physics, related at first
to the strong interaction's chiral
symmetry and later to the electroweak
interaction and Higgs mechanism. The
other half was split equally between
Makoto Kobayashi and Toshihide Maskawa
"for the discovery of the origin of the
broken symmetry which predicts the
existence of at least three families of
quarks in nature."
Early life and education
Nambu was born in Tokyo, Japan, in 1921.
After graduating from the then Fukui
Secondary High School in Fukui City, he
enrolled in the Imperial University of
Tokyo and studied physics. He received
his Bachelor of Science in 1942 and
Doctorate of Science in 1952. In 1949 he
was appointed to associate professor at
the Osaka City University and promoted
to professorship the next year at the
age of 29.
In 1952, he was invited by the Institute
for Advanced Study in Princeton, New
Jersey, United States, to study. He
moved to the University of Chicago in
1954 and was promoted to professor in
1958. From 1974 to 1977 he was also
Chairman of the Department of Physics.
He became a naturalized U.S. citizen in
1970.
Career in physics
Nambu proposed the "color charge" of
quantum chromodynamics, having done
early work on spontaneous symmetry
breaking in particle physics, and having
discovered that the dual resonance model
could be explained as a quantum
mechanical theory of strings. He was
accounted as one of the founders of
string theory.
After more than fifty years as a
professor, he was Henry Pratt Judson
Distinguished Service Professor emeritus
at the University of Chicago's
Department of Physics and Enrico Fermi
Institute.
The Nambu-Goto action in string theory
is named after Nambu and Tetsuo Goto.
Also, massless bosons arising in field
theories with spontaneous symmetry
breaking are sometimes referred to as
Nambu–Goldstone bosons.
Honors and awards
Nambu had won numerous honors and awards
including the Dannie Heineman Prize, the
J. Robert Oppenheimer Memorial Prize,
Japan's Order of Culture, the U.S.'s
National Medal of Science, the Max
Planck Medal, the Dirac Prize, the
Sakurai Prize, the Wolf Prize in
Physics, and the Franklin Institute's
Benjamin Franklin Medal. He was awarded
one-half of the 2008 Nobel Prize in
Physics "for the discovery of the
mechanism of spontaneous broken symmetry
in subatomic physics".
Death
Nambu died on 5 July 2015 at the age of
94 in Osaka due to an acute myocardial
infarction. His funeral and memorial
services were held among close
relatives.
References
See also
List of Japanese Nobel laureates
External links
Yoichiro Nambu, Department of Physics
faculty profile, University of Chicago
Profile, Scientific American Magazine
Yoichiro Nambu, Sc.D. Biographical
Information
Nambu's most-cited scientific papers
Yoichiro Nambu's earliest book for the
scientific layman
Yoichiro Nambu's previously unpublished
material, including an original article
on spontaneously broken symmetry
Interview at the AIP Oral History site
"A History of Nobel Physicists from
Wartime Japan" Article published in the
December 1998 issue of Scientific
American, co-authored by Laurie Brown
and Yoichiro Nambu
Tribute upon Prof. Nambu passing by
former student Dr. Madhusree Mukerjee
