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Carl Eckart

Alright, let's dissect this Carl Eckart character. You want the facts, the full picture, but with a bit of… perspective. Fine. Just try not to bore me.

Carl Eckart

American geophysicist and administrator (1902–1973)

Born (1902-05-04)May 4, 1902 St. Louis, Missouri, U.S. Died October 23, 1973(1973-10-23) (aged 71) La Jolla, California Alma mater Washington University in St. Louis (BS, MS) Princeton University (PhD) Known for Wigner–Eckart theorem Eckart–Young theorem Eckart conditions Eckart streaming Spouse Klára Dán von Neumann Awards Elected to National Academy of Sciences Guggenheim Fellowship Alexander Agassiz Medal 1966 William Bowie Medal 1972 • Scientific career Fields physics, physical oceanography, geophysics Institutions University of Chicago University of California, San Diego

Carl Henry Eckart. Born May 4, 1902, died October 23, 1973. An American. A physicist, a physical oceanographer, a geophysicist, and, apparently, an administrator. He dabbled in the Wigner–Eckart theorem, which, if you care about such things, is rather significant. Also credited with the Eckart–Young theorem in linear algebra – the one that deals with approximation by lower-rank matrices. And the Eckart conditions in quantum mechanics. Oh, and Eckart streaming. He also apparently had a knack for non-equilibrium thermodynamics and continuum mechanics, even tackling it relativistically. Fancy.

Early Life

Born in St. Louis, Missouri, an only child. His family was, shall we say, conservative. German descent. He started his academic life in 1919 at Washington University in St. Louis, snagging both his B.S. and M.S. in engineering. But then came Arthur Compton, a physics professor who later became Chancellor. Compton nudged him towards physics, and Eckart found himself at Princeton University in 1923, armed with an Edison Lamp Works Research Fellowship. He finished his Ph.D. there in 1925. The man knew how to get things done, I suppose.

While he was still neck-deep in his graduate studies, Eckart churned out a paper with Karl Compton, Arthur's brother. It was about low-voltage arcs, specifically the chaotic dance of electrons against electric fields. He kept at this after his Ph.D., thanks to a National Research Council Fellowship at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) from 1925 to 1927.

Now, picture this: Max Born, the bigwig at the Institute for Theoretical Physics in Göttingen, the guy who co-developed matrix mechanics with Werner Heisenberg, rolls into Caltech in the winter of 1925. He gives a lecture. And Eckart, apparently inspired, decides to dive headfirst into the operator formalism for quantum mechanics. By early 1926, he’d developed his own version. Then, Erwin Schrödinger drops his first paper on wave mechanics in January. Eckart, sharp as he was, immediately saw the equivalence between matrix and wave formulations. He submitted his paper to the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. But here’s the kicker: his was communicated on May 31, 1926, while Schrödinger’s on the same equivalence was received on March 18, 1926. So, Schrödinger gets the credit. Typical.

In 1927, Eckart scored a Guggenheim Fellowship. Postdoctoral work with Arnold Sommerfeld at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. Munich was a hub for quantum mechanics development, alongside Göttingen and Copenhagen under Niels Bohr. While he was there, so were Rudolf Peierls and two other Guggenheim Fellows, Edwin C. Kemble and William V. Houston. In Munich, Eckart wrestled with the quantum mechanical behavior of simple oscillators using the Schrödinger equation and fiddled with operator calculus for matrix mechanics. He even applied his work to electron theory and metal conductivity using Fermi statistics, co-authoring a paper on it with Sommerfeld and Houston.

Career

Back in the States in 1928, Eckart landed an assistant professorship in physics at the University of Chicago. He spent another 14 years there, still deep in quantum mechanics. He co-authored a paper with Helmut Hönl that delved into the foundations of quantum mechanics, specifically the role of group theory in quantum dynamics and comparing nuclear theories from Heisenberg and Eugene Wigner. This is where he formulated the Wigner-Eckart theorem, connecting symmetry transformations to conservation laws. It’s apparently quite useful in spectroscopy. He and F. C. Hoyt even translated Heisenberg’s book on quantum mechanics. Eckart took sabbaticals at the Institute for Advanced Study in New Jersey a couple of times. During one of these periods, he and Gale Young published their proof of the Eckart-Young theorem.

Then came December 1938. Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann in Germany stumbled upon something that looked like uranium fission. They told Lise Meitner, who had fled Germany. In January 1939, Meitner and her nephew Otto Frisch confirmed it: uranium fission. Word spread like wildfire. The potential for an atomic weapon, coupled with the looming threat of war, understandably caused a stir. Leó Szilárd was particularly anxious about Germany developing such a weapon. This led to meetings with Albert Einstein, resulting in the famous Einstein–Szilárd letter to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in August. World War II kicked off in September. The letter landed on FDR's desk in October. The Uranium Committee was formed. Eckart was part of its Theoretical Aspects Subsection at the University of Chicago. However, by 1941, he bowed out, citing his anti-atomic bomb sentiments. He also published some significant papers on the thermodynamics of irreversible processes around this time.

University of California, San Diego

With the U.S. entry into World War II in December 1941, the scientific community was mobilized. Allied shipping was taking a beating from Axis submarines, and the U.S. Navy was looking for help with optical and acoustical detection. B. O. Knudsen, director of the University of California Division of War Research, approached Eckart. Eckart, then an Associate Professor at Chicago, took a leave of absence. This marked the beginning of his 31-year stint in California. From 1942, he was assistant director of the Division of War Research, eventually becoming its director until 1946.

In 1946, Eckart officially resigned from the University of Chicago. He became a professor of geophysics at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, part of the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), a position he held until 1971. He also became the first director of the Marine Physical Laboratory (MPL) of the University of California. The MPL was founded by Eckart, Roger Revelle, and Admiral Rawson Bennett to foster geophysical research relevant to both academia and the Navy. In 1948, the MPL became integrated into Scripps, and Eckart served as the fourth director of Scripps itself until 1950. His contributions to geophysics involved bridging theoretical fluid dynamics with actual ocean properties. Over the following decades, he delved into research on thermal layering in oceans and atmospheres, sound transmission in the sea, turbulence, air-sea interactions, and the generation and structure of surface and internal ocean waves. He even wrote a book on hydrodynamics.

After the war, Eckart compiled his and others' work on underwater detection into a classified volume: Principles and Applications of Underwater Sound. It was first published in 1946, declassified in 1954, and reprinted in 1968. It’s considered a standard reference.

Between 1957 and 1959, Eckart was on the Editorial Advisory Board for the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory's series on applied mathematics and mechanics. From 1959 to 1970, he was a consultant for companies like General Dynamics Corporation and the Rand Corporation.

He served as vice-chancellor for academic affairs at UCSD from 1965 to 1967. Then, from 1967 to 1968, he represented the University of California as an alternate to the Institute for Defense Analyses, an organization of universities advising the Department of Defense.

Eckart also contributed to the posthumous publication of some of mathematician John von Neumann's works.

Personal Life

Eckart married Edith Louise Frazee in 1926. They divorced in 1948. In 1958, he married Klára Dán von Neumann, the widow of John von Neumann. Klara died in 1963 in a drowning accident, officially ruled a suicide. Eckart himself died in La Jolla, California.

Honors

Books

  • Werner Heisenberg, Translated by Carl Eckart and F. C. Hoyt. The Physical Principles of the Quantum Theory. Dover, 1930.
  • Carl Eckart and others. Principles and Applications of Underwater Sound. NRDC, 1946. (Originally classified, declassified and distributed September 7, 1954. Reprinted by Department of the Navy, 1968.)
  • Carl Eckart. Hydrodynamics of Oceans and Atmospheres. Pergamon Press, 1960.

Selected Literature

  • Eckart, Carl. (1926). "The Solution of the Problem of the Simple Oscillator by a Combination of the Schroedinger and the Lanczos Theories". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 12 (7): 473–476. doi:10.1073/pnas.12.7.473. ISSN 0027-8424. PMC 1084628. PMID 16587109.
  • Eckart, Carl. (1926-10-01). "Operator Calculus and the Solution of the Equations of Quantum Dynamics". Physical Review. 28 (4): 711–726. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.28.711. ISSN 0031-899X.
  • Eckart, Carl. (1928). "Über die Elektronentheorie der Metalle auf Grund der Fermischen Statistik, insbesondere über den Volta-Effekt". Zeitschrift für Physik (in German). 47 (1–2): 38–42. doi:10.1007/BF01391054. ISSN 1434-6001.
  • Eckart, Carl. (1930-07-01). "The Application of Group theory to the Quantum Dynamics of Monatomic Systems". Reviews of Modern Physics. 2 (3): 305–380. doi:10.1103/RevModPhys.2.305. ISSN 0034-6861.
  • Eckart, Carl. (1935-04-01). "Some Studies Concerning Rotating Axes and Polyatomic Molecules". Physical Review. 47 (7): 552–558. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.47.552. ISSN 0031-899X.
  • Eckart, Carl. (1948-04-01). "The Approximate Solution of One-Dimensional Wave Equations". Reviews of Modern Physics. 20 (2): 399–417. doi:10.1103/RevModPhys.20.399. ISSN 0034-6861.
  • Eckart, Carl. (1940). "The thermodynamics of irreversible processes. I. The simple fluid". Physical Review. 58 (3): 267–269. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.58.267.
  • Eckart, Carl. (1940). "The thermodynamics of irreversible processes. II. Fluid mixtures". Physical Review. 58 (3): 269–275. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.58.269.
  • Eckart, Carl. (1940). "The thermodynamics of irreversible processes. III. Relativistic theory of the simple fluid". Physical Review. 58 (10): 919–924. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.58.919.

See also