physics

Gregor Wentzel

Gregor Wentzel is a physics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Gregor Wentzel rather than just read about it. In short: Gregor Wentzel (17 February 1898 – 12 August 1978) was a German physicist known for development of quantum mechanics. Wentzel, Hendrik Kramers, and Léon Brillouin developed the Wentzel–Kramers–Brillouin approximation in 1926.

Key takeaways

Gregor Wentzel belongs to physics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Gregor Wentzel to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Gregor Wentzel from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Gregor Wentzel (17 February 1898 – 12 August 1978) was a German physicist known for development of quantum mechanics. Wentzel, Hendrik Kramers, and Léon Brillouin developed the Wentzel–Kramers–Brillouin approximation in 1926. In his early years, he contributed to X-ray spectroscopy, but then broadened out to make contributions to quantum mechanics, quantum electrodynamics, superconductivity and meson theory.

Biography

Early life and family Gregor Wentzel was born in Düsseldorf, Germany, as the first of four children of Joseph and Anna Wentzel. He married Anna Lauretta Wielich and his only child, Donat Wentzel, was born in 1934. The family moved to the United States in 1948 until he and Anny returned to Ascona, Switzerland in 1970.

Education and academia Wentzel began his university education in mathematics and physics in 1916, at the University of Freiburg. During 1917 and 1918, he served in the armed forces during World War I. He then resumed his education at the University of Freiburg until 1919, when he went to the University of Greifswald. In 1920, he went to the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU) to study under Arnold Sommerfeld. Wentzel was awarded his doctorate in 1921 and completed his Habilitation in 1922. He remained at LMU as a Privatdozent until he was called to Leipzig University in 1926 as an extraordinarius professor of mathematical physics. He became ordinarius professor in the Chair for Theoretical Physics, at the University of Zurich, when he succeeded Erwin Schrödinger, in 1928, the same year Wolfgang Pauli was appointed to the ETH Zurich. Together, Wentzel and Pauli built the reputation of Zurich as a center for theoretical physics. In 1948, Wentzel took a professorship at the University of Chicago. He retired in 1970 and went to spend his last years in Ascona, Switzerland.

Research In 1926, Wentzel, Hendrik Kramers, and Léon Brillouin independently developed what became known as the Wentzel–Kramers–Brillouin approximation, also known as the WKB approximation, classical approach, and phase integral method. Wentzel is also known for his contributions to photoemission and scattering theory. Late career work includes contributions to the discussion of gauge invariant theories of superconductivity.

Awards and honors In 1975, Wentzel was awarded the Max Planck Medal.

Bibliography

Books Gregor Wentzel. Einführung in die Quantentheorie der Wellenfelder. Franz Deuticke, 1943, 1946. Ann Arbor, Michigan: J.w. Edwards, 1943, 1946. (Translated by Charlotte Houtermans and J. M. Jauch, with an Appendix by J. M. Jauch. Quantum Theory of Fields. Interscience, 1949. Dover, 2003.) ISBN 0-486-43245-9 Gregor Wentzel. Lectures on Strong Coupling Meson Theory at the University of Rochester. 1954. Gregor Wentzel and notes by K. K. Gupta. Lectures on Special Topics in Field Theory. Lectures on Mathematics and Physics: Physics. Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, 1957. Gregor Wentzel. Lectures on Special Topics in Quantum Mechanics. Lectures on Mathematics and Physics. Physics, 3. Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, 1965.

Articles Arnold Sommerfeld and Gregor Wentzel. Über reguläre und irreguläre Dublett, Zeitschrift für Physik 7 86–92 (1921) as cited in Sommerfeld Bibliography.

See also Elastic recoil detection Shape resonance

Notes

References Jungnickel, Christa and Russell McCormmach. Intellectual Mastery of Nature: Theoretical Physics from Ohm to Einstein, Volume 1: The Torch of Mathematics, 1800 to 1870. University of Chicago Press, paper cover, 1990. ISBN 0-226-41582-1 Jungnickel, Christa and Russell McCormmach. Intellectual Mastery of Nature. Theoretical Physics from Ohm to Einstein, Volume 2: The Now Mighty Theoretical Physics, 1870 to 1925. University of Chicago Press, Paper cover, 1990. ISBN 0-226-41585-6 Mehra, Jagdish, and Helmut Rechenberg. The Historical Development of Quantum Theory. Volume 1 Part 1 The Quantum Theory of Planck, Einstein, Bohr and Sommerfeld 1900–1925: Its Foundation and the Rise of Its Difficulties. Springer, 2001. ISBN 0-387-95174-1 Mehra, Jagdish, and Helmut Rechenberg. The Historical Development of Quantum Theory. Volume 5 Erwin Schrödinger and the Rise of Wave Mechanics. Part 2 Schrödinger in Vienna and Zurich 1887–1925. Springer, 2001. ISBN 0-387-95180-6 Schiff, Leonard I. Quantum Mechanics. McGraw-Hill, 3rd edition, 1968.

Further reading Peter G. O. Freund, Charles J. Goebel, and Yoichiro Nambu, Editors. Quanta: Collection of Papers Dedicated to Gregor Wentzel. University of Chicago Press, 1970.

External links Thomas S. Kuhn. Oral History Transcript – Gregor Wentzel. Archived 2015-01-12 at the Wayback Machine Niels Bohr Library and Archives, American Institute of Physics, 1964. Peter G. O. Freund, Charles J. Goebel, Yoichiro Nambu, and Reinhard Oehme. Gregor Wentzel 1898–1978 – A Biographical Memoir. National Academy of Sciences, 2009. S.Antoci and D.-E.Liebscher. The Third Way to Quantum Mechanics is the Forgotten First. Annales Fond.Broglie 21 (1996) 349. Gregor Wentzel – ETH Bibliothek. Gregor Wentzel at Find a Grave

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Gregor Wentzel

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Gregor Wentzel claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In physics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Gregor Wentzel before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Gregor Wentzel ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Gregor Wentzel

In research: Gregor Wentzel appears in physics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Gregor Wentzel in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Gregor Wentzel is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1898 births, 1978 deaths, 20th-century German physicists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Gregor Wentzel outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Gregor Wentzel in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Gregor Wentzel means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Gregor Wentzel out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Gregor Wentzel in simple terms?

Why does Gregor Wentzel matter?

Because it connects several physics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Gregor Wentzel?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Gregor Wentzel.