San José State University |
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applet-magic.com Thayer Watkins Silicon Valley, Tornado Alley & the Gateway to the Rockies USA |
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of Subatomic Particles |
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In 1922 the physicists Otto Stern and Walther Gerlach ejected a beam of silver atoms into a sharply varying magnetic field. The beam separated into two parts. In 1926 Samuel A. Goudsmit and George E. Uhlenbeck showed that this separation could be explained by the valence electrons of the silver atoms having a spin that is oriented in either of two directions. It has been long asserted that this so-called spin is not literally particle spin. It is often referred to as intrinsic spin whatever that might mean. However here in the material that follows it is accepted that the magnet moment of any particle is due to its actual spinning and the spin rate can be computed from its measured magnetic moment.
Conclusions
There is no problem in interpreting the spins of subatomic particles as being due to their actual physical spinning.
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