Reborn and become a Great Scientist

Chapter 193 Chapter 141

Although Hydrogen is not the Monkey King who can make a big fuss in the Heavenly Palace, it still disturbs Chen Muwu a little bit.

The long evaporation process was finally over, and nearly six liters of liquid hydrogen were evaporated to only a few milliliters of liquid in a low-temperature environment of [-] Kelvin.

According to his vision, after a large amount of hydrogen with the lowest boiling point is evaporated, a lot of liquid deuterium and liquid deuterated hydrogen with a higher boiling point should accumulate in these liquids.

The next thing to do is to put the remaining few milliliters of liquid into the vacuum glass tube and vaporize it, and then connect the electrodes in the glass tube with power to excite the hydrogen, deuterium and deuterated hydrogen mixed inside. make them produce emission spectra.

Chen Muwu did exactly that. After completing all these steps, he gave Oppenheimer a luminous glass tube.

This is really feeding the food into his mouth. His student with relatively poor hands-on ability, now only needs to find the position and intensity of the special spectral line under the spectrometer to find out what is in the mixed gas sample. What exactly is there.

After finishing these things, Chen Muwu, who had been busy for a long time and was somewhat tired, could finally relax.

He walked out of the laboratory door slowly and strayed to the office in Old Prague, wanting to chat with him and pass the boring waiting time.

"Rare guest, rare guest! I haven't seen you leaving the door of the laboratory very often these days. Why do you have so much time today? Could it be that your superconductivity research has achieved some initial results, Dr. Chen?"

Although he thought that Chen Muwu was cheated out of money by the Dutch, Old Prague reprimanded him.

But today, seeing the God of Wealth who has brought a lot of funds to David Faraday Laboratory with only a small piece of glass, the director of the laboratory still has a sincere smile on his face.

"Well," Chen Muwu responded, he did not tell the old Prague that he is not researching superconductivity as originally planned, but is spending money like land to evaporate the high-priced liquid hydrogen bought from Leiden University, "Robert is experimenting I will observe it for me in the room, and it will not take long for him to get the result of this observation."

After sitting on the chair, Chen Muwu placed a large glass beaker on the old Prague desk.

It was packed full of strawberries, each of which was covered with a layer of hoarfrost, and the mouth of the beaker was still emitting white gas continuously.

Chen Muwu finally got rid of the excess liquid nitrogen in those laboratories. Although he didn't buy bananas from the tropics, he caught up with strawberries already on the market in the UK, so he made some liquid nitrogen to freeze strawberries. Come out, as a kind of snack to relieve the summer heat.

"Sir Prague, try this."

The temperature from his fingertips when he touched the strawberry already stunned Old Prague for a moment.

After putting this strawberry in his mouth and feeling its hardness with his teeth, he immediately understood how such a strawberry came from.

After holding it in his mouth for a long time, he chewed and swallowed the strawberry, and then said with a smile: "Dr. What are you going to do? Go back to Cambridge, or stay in London, and I can find you a professorship at University College London."

Looking at the brightest young talent in the physics field today, and it may also be a fortune tree that can continue to make money, how can old Prague not stop loving talents.

He planned to cut off his old friend Rutherford and let Chen Muwu stay under his command.

Hearing the word "professor", Chen Muwu remembered that his teacher Rutherford was afraid that he would never return after arriving in Denmark, so he was fooling himself like this.

He said that after he came back from Denmark, he would operate him as the new Lucas Chair Professor of Mathematics. Even if the operation was unsuccessful, he would set up a separate theoretical professorship for himself in the Cavendish Laboratory .

Now I have been back to England for half a year, but where is the position of professor?
Old Prague's words reminded Chen Muwu that he decided to go back to Cambridge University after completing the series of experiments in London, and he must discuss with his teacher for an explanation.

Having been Dr. Chen for several years, it is time for him to change his title. He should have become Prof. Chen long ago!
"Sir, I still intend to go back to Cambridge University. The standard of living in the big city of London is too high for me to afford."

The excuse Chen Muwu made was very clumsy, but Old Prague didn't expose him either.

He was just a little envious of Rutherford in his heart. Not only was he able to manage such a large laboratory in an orderly manner, but he also trained so many capable and talented students and produced many excellent physics achievements.

The two of them tacitly agreed that they did not continue on this topic, but talked about other things.

Before one-third of a beaker of frozen strawberries had been eaten, there was another knock on the door outside the office.

"Mr. Chen, Mr. Chen, are you inside?"

Hearing this name, you know it's Oppenheimer.

There is obvious excitement in his voice, has the spectral line of deuterium atoms been found?
It seems that Oppenheimer's hands-on ability is not bad, and the time he spent was much shorter than what Chen Muwu imagined.

"It should be the final result from the laboratory, Sir Bragg, then I will take my leave first."

Chen Muwu got up while saying goodbye.

After walking out of the office, he found that the excitement on Oppenheimer's face was more obvious than that in his voice just now.

It has been a year since Oppenheimer came to the UK from the United States. Although he was a member of the Cavendish Laboratory, he witnessed the experimental results for the first time in the David Faraday Laboratory today. .

"Find that line?"

"We found that spectral line! Mr. Chen, we found the isotope of hydrogen!"

Of course.

After hearing the result, Chen Muwu deliberately acted calmly.

If he hadn't known about the presence of deuterium, why would he have to spend a lot of money to buy liquid hydrogen in the Netherlands, and why would he waste time staring at a "boiling water" stove in love with each other in an environment of [-] Kelvin?

Chen Muwu thought in his mind, when he returned to the laboratory, checked the spectral line in the eyepiece of the spectrometer, and confirmed that it was the spectrum of deuterium atoms, he should prepare to write the paper again.

It seems that I haven't written a paper for a long time?

The spectrometer remained at the position where Oppenheimer left, so that Chen Muwu could see the line in the center of the eyepiece at first glance.

It's just that the light of this spectral line is too dim. If it wasn't for Oppenheimer's reminder, the spectral line would be right in the center of the eyepiece.

Chen Mu felt that if he were to observe alone, he would definitely ignore this spectral line.

There is only one reason for the dim spectral line, that is, the previous attempt to enrich deuterium by evaporation in a low-temperature environment failed, or was not successful enough.

Now, a new problem has emerged.

Chen Muwu knew that deuterium existed in this world, and Oppenheimer also preconceivedly believed that Chen Muwu said that there is a hydrogen isotope heavier than hydrogen in this world.

So this spectral line is considered by the two of them to be the spectrum of deuterium, which is completely fine.

It’s just that for others, the intensity of this spectral line can’t explain the existence of deuterium at all, maybe it’s just some impurities in liquid hydrogen.

For the thesis to stand up, stronger evidence must be provided.

For example, a brighter spectral line.

Such a long time of hard work was in vain, and there was no choice but to start all over again.

Chen Muwu felt that his blood pressure was a bit high, and he had to find a way to lower it.

Yep, buck!
I should have thought of this earlier!
In a standard atmospheric pressure environment, the evaporation of liquid hydrogen fails, so try switching to the triple point of hydrogen!
The so-called triple point is a temperature and pressure that can make the gas phase, liquid phase and solid phase of a substance exist at the same time.

For water, at a pressure of 611.73 Pascals, water will coexist in three phases of solid, liquid and gas at 0.01 degrees Celsius.

This is a demonstration experiment often seen in science and technology museums. Under this pressure and temperature, the water sealed in the biscuits will magically boil and freeze at the same time.

And Sir Dewar, the predecessor of British low temperature physics, when he liquefied hydrogen in this David-Faraday laboratory, left Chen Muwu a precious wealth, that is, he measured the triple point of hydrogen : Pressure [-] Pascals, temperature [-] Kelvins.

Chen Muwu took out the Debye theory again, and made new calculations near the triple point of liquid hydrogen.

The calculation results this time show that near the triple point, the vapor pressure ratio of hydrogen and deuterium is less than [-].

This means that distilling hydrogen at the triple point ensures that the deuterium concentration meets the requirements!
Oppenheimer had been staring worriedly at Chen Muwu ever since he said nothing and took his eyes away from the eyepiece.

With the performance of the teacher, his mood also changed from happy to more and more uncertain.

Could it be that my own observation was wrong, that spectral line is not emitted by deuterium?
It wasn't until Chen Muwu left the laboratory, returned with Dewar's research data, and then put down the pen he was calculating on the paper, that Oppenheimer asked cautiously: "Mr. Chen, is there something wrong? But That line is right there!"

"Robert, there was indeed some trouble just now..."

Chen Muwu explained to him the problem with that spectral line.

"...But I have found a solution to the problem, hurry up and do this experiment again, this time we will definitely succeed!
"Oh, and don't be idle, take a photo of the spectral line at this time, see if you can clearly record it on the negative, and save it for later comparison."

Chen Muwu was busy cooling down the temperature and pressure in the experimental equipment, and Oppenheimer was here recalling what he had learned at Harvard University, how to record spectra with film.

After experiencing doubts, depression and panic, the two people in the laboratory began to "operate" in an orderly manner.

Fortunately, a few days later, the experiment had to succeed and finally succeeded.

If he still fails this time, Chen Muwu will doubt his life.

Could it be that those people at Leiden University sold themselves pure hydrogen without any impurities?
How is that possible!
This time, in the eyepiece of the spectrometer, Oppenheimer saw a clear spectral line dozens of times brighter than the last time at the same position where the spectral line was found before.

Although pure deuterium gas could not be produced, this new spectral line that appeared outside the spectrum of hydrogen atoms was like the fingerprint of criminals.

It shows that an isotope heavier than hydrogen does exist in this world.

Oppenheimer just wanted to jump up and celebrate with an American hug with his teacher.

As a result, a hand was put on his shoulder immediately, and Oppenheimer was firmly pressed on the seat: "Don't get excited, if you accidentally touch the spectrometer, you will have to adjust it for a long time. Use negative film to record It’s serious to look at the spectrum, after all, it will be used when writing a thesis.”

Only then did the Americans realize that this discovery was enough to call it "great" for themselves.

But for Mr. Chen, this discovery can only be ranked very late in his scientific research career, and it can be regarded as an insignificant small achievement.

That's why he can be so calm.

Oppenheimer took photos, while Chen Muwu changed a table to write letters.

The three isotopes of hydrogen, H-1, H-2, and H-3, have very vivid translations in Chinese, protium, deuterium, and tritium.

The number of 丨 or 丿 under the prefix of gas represents the number of nucleons contained in the isotopic nucleus.

In the original time and space, it took Yuri less than half a year to discover deuterium.

However, the United States and the United Kingdom have been arguing for more than two years about the naming of deuterium H-2.

American Lawrence, the one who invented the cyclotron, hoped to use the Greek deuteros, which means "second", as the root, and named the deuterium as deuterium and the deuterium nucleus as deuteron.

However, when Rutherford gave a report at the Royal Society, he pointed out that the British academic circles hoped to use the Greek word diploos, which means "double", as the root, to call heavy hydrogen diplogen, and heavy hydrogen nuclei called diplon.

The two Ernests (coincidentally, both Rutherford and Lawrence have this name), representing the academic circles of the two countries, had an argument across the Atlantic over which Greek word should be used to name deuterium. chatter.

In the end, the Americans who discovered heavy hydrogen won, and the British proposal was not accepted.

But now, the discovery of heavy hydrogen has been replaced by the Chinese.

In Chen Muwu's heart, heavy hydrogen is deuterium, a simple and beautiful Chinese character.

As for whether it is called deuterium or diplogen in English, it doesn't matter to him.

Then it's better to give a favor and give the naming rights of deuterium to your teacher.

Even if the Americans quarrel with Rutherford over the name issue, they are not afraid. After all, Chen Muwu is the discoverer of heavy hydrogen, and he can help the teacher unscrupulously this time.

There is another reason why he gave away the naming rights, that is, the weather is getting hotter every day, and Rutherford's birthday is coming again.

Last year, Zhu Zhaoxin gave him many expensive gifts, but Chen Muwu, who has become more and more stingy because of the construction of the school, did not want to spend so much money this time.

(End of this chapter)