Historical Roots of Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking

After a high-school degree in Classics, Rocco Gaudenzi earned his Master and Doctoral degree in physics at the ETH Zurich and the Delft University of Technology, publishing in the fields of solid-state physics, quantum magnetism and the thermodynamics of information processing. He has then moved on to do research on the conceptual dynamics, historical and philosophical dimensions of science. At the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin he carried out an investigation on the flow of concepts and formalisms between modern low-energy physics and high-energy physics, and the two-way analogical transfer of mathematical methods and theoretical frameworks.

• Shows How Different Sub-disciplines can have a Beneficial Influence on Each Other.- Traits of an Emerging Tradition: Modern Physics in Japan.- Yoichiro Nambu and the Collective Description of Many-particle Systems.- Elementary Particles as Excitations of a Solid Medium. Is the Universe a Superconductor?.- Historical and Epistemological Reflections.