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Was Sommerfeld wrong? (To the history of the appearance of spin in relativistic wave equations)


Department of Chemistry, M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University, Leninskie Gory, Moscow, 119992, Russian Federation

This article presents a brief history of the appearance of electron spin in relativistic wave equations. Dirac derived his wave equation in 1928 with the intention to obtain an equation for the "simplest" particle with spin zero. But, as Dirac later announced at the European Conference on Particle Physics (Budapest, 4—9 July 1977), it was a big surprise for him that the equation described the states of a particle with spin 1/2.

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Fulltext is also available at DOI: 10.3367/UFNe.2019.11.038695
Keywords: spin, relativistic wave equations
PACS: 01.65.+g, 03.65.−w (all)
DOI: 10.3367/UFNe.2019.11.038695
URL: https://ufn.ru/en/articles/2020/7/g/
000575189200007
2-s2.0-85092533766
2020PhyU...63..721P
Citation: Petrov S V "Was Sommerfeld wrong? (To the history of the appearance of spin in relativistic wave equations)" Phys. Usp. 63 721–724 (2020)
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Received: 9th, September 2019, 11th, November 2019

Оригинал: Петров С В «Ошибался ли Зоммерфельд? (К истории появления спина в релятивистских волновых уравнениях)» УФН 190 777–780 (2020); DOI: 10.3367/UFNr.2019.11.038695

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