physics

Sidney Drell

Sidney Drell 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 Sidney Drell rather than just read about it. In short: Sidney David Drell (September 13, 1926 – December 21, 2016) was an American theoretical physicist and arms control expert. At the time of his death, he was professor emeritus at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) and senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.

Key takeaways

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

Reference excerpt

Sidney David Drell (September 13, 1926 – December 21, 2016) was an American theoretical physicist and arms control expert. At the time of his death, he was professor emeritus at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) and senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Drell was a noted contributor in the fields of quantum electrodynamics and high-energy particle physics. The Drell–Yan process, which was used to discover the Higgs boson, is partially named for him.

Biography Drell's parents immigrated to America from Ukraine early in the twentieth century and both went on to obtain college degrees. Born in Atlantic City, New Jersey on September 13, 1926, Drell graduated from Atlantic City High School in 1943, at the age of sixteen. Drell entered Princeton for the summer term in July 1943, and worked with Josef-Maria Jauch in his junior year and completing his senior thesis "Radiating Electrons" with John Archibald Wheeler. He earned his undergraduate degree in physics from Princeton University in 1946. He was awarded a masters in physics in 1947 and received his PhD from the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign in 1949. He co-authored the textbooks Relativistic Quantum Mechanics and Relativistic Quantum Fields with James Bjorken. Drell was active as a scientific advisor to the U.S. government, and was a founding member of the JASON Defense Advisory Group. He was also on the board of directors of Los Alamos National Security, the company that operates the Los Alamos National Laboratory. He was an expert in the field of nuclear arms control and cofounder of the Center for International Security and Arms Control, now the Center for International Security and Cooperation. He was a Senior Fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution and a trustee Emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. In early 1970s, Drell (together with Tung-Mow Yan) did theoretical calculations of lepton pair production in hadronic collisions (Drell–Yan process), which became an important way to study the parton structure of hadrons. He was the father of Persis Drell, former head of SLAC national accelerator lab, former dean of the Stanford University School of Engineering, and (through Fall 2023) provost of Stanford University; Joanna Drell, Professor of History and chair of the Department of History at the University of Richmond; and Daniel Drell, a program officer at the U.S. Department of Energy. Sidney Drell died in December 2016 at his home in Palo Alto, California at the age of 90.

Awards and honors Member of the National Academy of Sciences (1969) Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1971) Member of the American Philosophical Society (1987) The 11th Annual Heinz Award in Public Policy Enrico Fermi Award, 2000 National Intelligence Distinguished Service Medal, 2001 National Medal of Science, 2011 (presented by President Barack Obama on February 1, 2013)

References

External links

Oral history interview transcript with Sidney Drell on 1 July 1986, American Institute of Physics, Niels Bohr Library & Archives SLAC: Sidney Drell Hoover Institution: Sidney Drell Sidney D. Drell papers at the Hoover Institution Archives The Academic Tree

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Sidney Drell

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Sidney Drell 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 Sidney Drell 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 Sidney Drell 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 Sidney Drell

In research: Sidney Drell 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 Sidney Drell 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: Sidney Drell is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1926 births, 2016 deaths, American particle physicists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Sidney Drell 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.

Ask Teacher Smith questions about this articleOpens your AI tutor with a question about “Sidney Drell” →

Affiliate

Preply — study more efficiently by working with a personal tutor. 50% off.

How to study Sidney Drell in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Sidney Drell 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 Sidney Drell out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Sidney Drell in simple terms?

Why does Sidney Drell 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 Sidney Drell?

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 Sidney Drell.