Physics

1998 · ref. 2610ec541 — New York: W. W. Norton & Company 1998. BP2 - A first edition stated with complete numberline hardcover book SIGNED and dated by John A. Wheeler with "With warmest good wishes!" written on the half-title page in very good condition in very good dust jacket is mylar protected. Dust jacket has some wrinkling chipping and crease on the edges and corners small open tear/chipped on the back bottom edge some scattered chipping/bug damage on the opposite side some light discoloration and shelf wear. Book has some bumped corners some wrinkling on the spine edges some scattered chipping/bug damage on the cover near the edges and some on the top cover edges some spot stains on the top page edges light discoloration and shelf wear. 9.5"x6.5" 380 pages. Satisfaction Guaranteed. John Archibald Wheeler was an American theoretical physicist. He was largely responsible for reviving interest in general relativity in the United States after World War II. Wheeler also worked with Niels Bohr to explain the basic principles of nuclear fission. Together with Gregory Breit Wheeler explored positron-electron pair production from the collision of two photons now known as the Breit-Wheeler process. He is known for popularizing the term "black hole" to describe the gravitationally completely collapsed objects predicted by general relativity. He also coined "quantum foam" "neutron moderator" "wormhole" and "it from bit" and hypothesized the "one-electron universe". Stephen Hawking called Wheeler the "hero of the black hole story". At 21 Wheeler earned his doctorate at Johns Hopkins University under the supervision of Karl Herzfeld. He studied under Breit and Bohr on a National Research Council fellowship. In 1939 he collaborated with Bohr on a series of papers using the liquid drop model to explain the mechanism of fission. During World War II he worked with the Manhattan Project's Metallurgical Laboratory in Chicago where he helped design nuclear reactors and then at the Hanford Site in Richland Washington where he helped DuPont build them. He returned to Princeton after the war but returned to government service to help design and build the hydrogen bomb in the early 1950s. He and Edward Teller were the main civilian proponents of thermonuclear weapons. For most of his career Wheeler was a professor of physics at Princeton University which he joined in 1938 remaining until 1976. At Princeton he supervised 46 PhD students more than any other physics professor. Wheeler left Princeton at the age of 65. He was appointed director of the Center for Theoretical Physics at the University of Texas at Austin in 1976 and remained in the position until 1986 when he retired and became a professor emeritus. With Kip Thorne and Charles Misner he coauthored the general relativity textbook Gravitation. Signed by Author. First Edition. Hardcover. Very Good/Very Good. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall. W. W. Norton & Company Hardcover