Lectures on Theoretical Physics: Volume 2

Hendrik Antoon Lorentz

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Born in Holland, Hendrik Lorentz was a graduate of the University of Leiden, receiving his Ph.D. in 1875. In 1877, Lorentz became a professor of theoretical physics there. Upon his retirement from the University of Leiden in 1912, Lorentz was appointed director of the Teyler Laboratory in Haarlem. Lorentz had wide-ranging interests in physics and mathematics as his linguistic abilities allowed him to follow the scientific trends in Europe. His major work, however, was the development of the electromagnetic theory of James Clark Maxwell. In fact, Lorentz refined the theory so that a radical change in the foundations of physics became necessary. This provided the inspiration for Albert Einstein's theory of relativity. In a series of articles from 1892 to 1904, Lorentz proposed his "electron theory." The theory explained that atoms and molecules of matter contain small rigid bodies carrying a charge---now known as electrons. By 1895, Lorentz described the force (now known as the Lorentz force) on charged particles of matter in an electromagnetic field. In 1902, Lorentz and Pieter Zeeman shared the Nobel Prize in physics for their investigations of the influence of magnetic fields on radiation. Two years later, he published "Lorentz Transformations" concerning transformations of space and time coordinates with respect to a frame of reference. Lorentz Transformations were important in Einstein's special theory of relativity (1905). In his later life, Lorentz played a major role in restoring international scientific relations after World War I.