Article ID: CBB522059188

The problem of solar energy generation: from Eddington to Bethe (2024)

unapi

Abstract The problem of explaining the Sun’s enormous output of heat and light was first attacked in the 1840s and soon resulted in a consensus view that solar energy was mechanical in origin. From about 1860 to 1905 the standard model was the so-called Helmholtz-Thomson contraction theory which however faced a number of serious problems. Physicists and astronomers slowly realised that the source was not mechanical but due to intra-atomic processes, either proton-electron annihilation or fusion of hydrogen into helium atoms. Both possibilities were discussed by Arthur Eddington in the 1920s, but it was only with quantum mechanics and a new picture of the atomic nucleus that quantitative models were developed. The old riddle of solar energy was essentially solved with Hans Bethe’s celebrated theory published in 1938-1939. This paper briefly reviews the developments from about 1850 to 1940.

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Authors & Contributors
Stanley, Matthew
Batten, Alan H.
Durham, Ian T.
Almassi, Ben
Crawford, Paulo
French, Steven
Journals
British Journal for the History of Science
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics
Physics in Perspective
European Physical Journal H
Isis: International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences
Journal for the History of Astronomy
Publishers
Harvard University
Guaraldi
Harvard University Press
Viking
Concepts
Physics
Astronomy
Quantum mechanics
Science and religion
Relativity
Biographies
People
Eddington, Arthur Stanley
Bethe, Hans Albrecht
Jeans, James Hopwood
Einstein, Albert
Frank, Philipp
Perrin, Jean Baptiste
Time Periods
20th century, early
20th century
20th century, late
19th century
Places
Germany
Great Britain
Italy
France
Portugal
United States
Institutions
Cornell University
Royal Observatory Greenwich
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