One of Ireland's greatest scientists made an "elegant" contribution to discoveries in physics without ever realising it. His work later helped to open up a new area of research and his mathematical discoveries are still in use, according to one of the world's leading physicists.
Prof Murray Gell-Mann, winner of the 1969 Nobel Prize for physics, yesterday delivered the first annual Irish Times/Royal Irish Academy Hamilton Lecture. Funded by DEPFA Bank, the lecture commemorates the contribution made by Dublin-born Sir William Rowan Hamilton (1805-1865). It was entitled, "On Hamilton, Bridges and Contemporary Science".
Hamilton devised a new form of mathematics called quaternions, used today in physics but also computer graphics. He also completed a very important "reformulation" that unified two areas of physics, mechanics and optics, said Prof Gell-Mann of the Santa Fe Institute, New Mexico.
"He reformed them in a very important way." The reformulation enabled him to make theoretical predictions that were later proven by experiment. It "foreshadowed quantum mechanics which revolutionised theoretical physics" after 1920.
Quantum mechanics was discovered in that year and described amongst other things how light had characteristics of a wave and a particle. Hamilton "came so close" to this himself with his reformulation of mechanics and optics, Prof Gell-Mann said.
"A beautiful way to do quantum mechanics is to use his reformulation of mechanics," said the professor who won the Nobel Prize for his discovery of "quarks"- sub atomic particles - and a way to understand and categorise them.
"Reformulation can often make possible the step that leads to generalisation." Generalisation refers to the researcher's attempt to develop simpler mathematical explanations for natural phenomena, for example how gravity or electromagnetism works. "What \ didn't know was that his reformulation would make generalisation so easy for quantum mechanics."
Einstein's general theory of relativity was a generalisation of Newton's theories. This did not mean that Newton's work no longer applied, just that it had been refined to encompass more natural phenomena. Einstein's theory in turn was generalised to include the strong and weak atomic forces found inside the atom.