untitled

202

The roots of today’s

Physik-

Department

at TUM go back to

the foundation of the

Polytechnische Schule
München

in 1868 whose name

was changed to

Technische

Hochschule München

(THM) in

1877 and finally to

Technische

Universität München

(TUM) in

1970. Concomitant with its foun-
dation in the year 1868 the

Physikalische Institut

was

founded, originally called

Physikalisches Cabinet

. In paral-

lel technical physics has been a
matter of particular concern since

the early days and, at the instiga-
tion of

Carl von Linde

(1842 -

1934), a major industrialist and
honorary professor at the THM,
the

Laboratorium für

Technische Physik

was created

in 1902. It was not until 1943 that
an independent

Institut für

Theoretische Physik

was also

founded. These three institutes
were finally combined and
expanded into the

Physik-

Department

in 1965, whose

basic structure and organization
is maintained up to today. The
successful development of
research institutes and disciplines
depends on the far-sightedness
of individuals and the history of
physics at TUM is characterized
by many such personalities.

The “Königlich Bayerische Hochschule zu München”, 1910

The first director of the

Physikalisches Cabinet

was

Wilhelm von Beetz

(1822 - 1886)

between 1868 and 1886, an
excellent teacher who wrote for
example the well-known
“Leitfaden der Physik”. His suc-
cessor was

Leonhard Sohncke

(1842 - 1897) who guided the
institute between 1886 and 1897.
He was a pioneer of the mathe-
matical description of crystalline
structures. The discovery of the
concept of space groups by
adding screw axis and glide
planes to the 32 crystal classes is
one example of his major
achievements. It was originally his
idea to set up a joint colloquium
involving the physicists from THM
and University of Munich
(“Sohncke-Kolloquium”). The
THM owes its particular tradition
in physics teaching to Sohncke’s
successor,

Hermann Ebert

(1861

- 1913), head of the institute from
1898 until his death in 1913. He
introduced for example experi-
mental exercises as part of the
education of physics and engi-
neering students. His research
work was predominantly devoted
to geophysics and atmospheric
electricity in particular. His experi-
ments on cosmic radiation using
free balloons may be considered
as precursor of modern nuclear

204

and astrophysics. Another impor-
tant personality at that time was

Robert Emden

(1863 – 1940),

associate professor since 1907
and member of the Bayerische
Akademie der Wissenschaften
from 1920 onwards. In 1933 he
fled from the National Socialists
to Switzerland. He worked scien-
tifically in meteorology and his
book on “Gaskugeln –
Anwendungen der mechanischen
Wärmetheorie auf kosmologische
und meteorologische Probleme”
(1907) became a classic in astro-
physics. After the early death of
Ebert,

Jonathan Zenneck

(1871 -

1959) became head of the insti-
tute from 1913 until 1936. His
experimental work was devoted
to wireless signal transmission, an
area of research which he picked
up earlier as an assistant to
Ferdinand Braun in Straßburg.
Apart from many scientific publi-
cations his pioneering work led
also to various patents and appli-
cations. A second area of his
research was related to the iono-
sphere. He is considered the
father of ionospheric research in
Germany giving it a center at the
Herzogstand test station. He was
early to recognize the importance
of this young science for geo-
physics and astrophysics and
organized a large network of
ionospheric stations in Central
Europe. Zenneck also had other

physicists as introduction to theo-
retical physics. From 1941
onwards he was leading physicist
and scientific expert on the man-
agement board of Carl Zeiss in
Jena, remaining in contact with
the academic world by holding an
honorary professorship in Jena.
Between 1947 and 1949 he lived
in the United States and later
undertook to reconstruct the insti-
tute with much enthusiasm. His
time in the U.S. had increased his
awareness of the future role of
physics at THM and it was he
who set new directions by using
his influence to appoint

Heinz

Maier-Leibnitz

, a nuclear physi-

cist as successor of

Walther

Meißner

as director of the

Institut für Technische Physik

1952. Shortly before his death in
1959 he wrote the following
words: “Today the pride and joy
of the Technische Hochschule is
the laboratory for technical
physics that used to be entirely
devoted to thermodynamics.
There was not much of under-
standing when in 1952, a nuclear
physicist was appointed as direc-
tor of the institute on the sugges-
tion of the physicists. This was
the start of the process from
which the Technische Hochschule
München developed into a center
of pure and applied nuclear
physics. However, if one com-
pares the physics in Munich, with
three institutes and three full pro-
fessors with that of American

far-sighted organisational talents.
It was he who took the initiative
to construct the famous large
physics lecture hall at THM in the
Arcisstraße, now called Carl-von-
Linde Hörsaal, with seating for
860 students, at the time one of
the largest in the whole of
Germany. It is still in use for many
different lectures and other
events. Zenneck followed Oskar
von Miller as chairman of the
board of governors of the
Deutsche Museum in 1933.
Thanks to his seemingly never-
ending energy and enthusiasm,
the museum was restored after
the Second World War to its for-
mer splendour. Eventually, in
1939, a successor to Zenneck
was found in

Rudolf Tomaschek

(1895 - 1966). He was an experi-
mental physicist and known
through his complete revision of
Grimsehl’s “Lehrbuch der Physik”
(1929). In the field of geophysics
his gravimetric work gave him
international reputation. After the
end of the Second World War in
1945 he was relieved of his office,
and the

Physikalische Institut

had been almost completely
destroyed. On September 1, 1946

Georg Joos

(1894 - 1959) took

over the institute as professor for
experimental physics. He had
been professor of Physics at the
University of Göttingen until 1941,
working both theoretically and
experimentally and wrote for
example the book “Theoretische
Physik”, a well known textbook
which was used by generations of

205

institutes, in terms of both equip-
ment and staff, the ratio would be
as bad as 1:10.” It is unfortunate
that Georg Joos did not live long
enough to see the development
of physics at THM in the 60’s with
the foundation of the

Physik-

Department

in 1965 when the

Physikalische Institut

, the

Institut für Technische Physik

and the

Institut für theoretische

Physik

were combined and the

spectrum of activities broadened
considerably.

The

Institut für Technische

Physik

was founded in 1902. The

priority given to technical physics
has been a matter of particular
concern since the foundation of
the Polytechnische Schule. Many
illustrious names accompany its
history, names that culminate in

Carl von Linde

(1842 - 1934),

who used his influence at the end
of the 19th century to create the

Laboratorium für Technische
Physik

. In collaboration with

Walter von Dyck

(1856 - 1934),

professor for mathematics and at
that time Rector of THM, he
raised the necessary funding for
this new laboratory. Von Linde
insisted that the laboratory is
headed by a young physicist, who
would understand the technologi-
cal needs of the laboratory and
also guarantees excellent educa-
tion of engineering students in
physics and technology. The

physicist

Oscar Knoblauch

(1862

- 1946) met von Linde’s program-
matic requirements. He was head
of the institute for 32 years. The
main focus of the work of
Knoblauch and his team was nat-
urally to master engineering chal-
lenges in connection with thermo-
dynamics. This included for
example Joule-Thomson-Effect,
flow phenomena, heat transport
or in short, the questions of prac-
tical thermodynamics related to
the area of Linde’s refrigeration
technology and air-liquification.
Other areas of applied research
were focussed on sound protec-
tion and thermal insulation of
buildings. Thanks to Knoblauch,
a scientific environment was cre-
ated which enabled engineering
students to receive an excellent
education in pure as well as
ex-perimental and technical
physics. It is no coincidence that

Wilhelm Nusselt

(1883 - 1957),

one of Knoblauch’s best students,
became in charge of the institute
of

Theoretische Maschinenlehre

as professor for thermodynamics
from 1925 until 1952. Under very
difficult circumstances,

Walther

Meißner

(1882 - 1974) took over

this institute in 1934. He is con-
sidered to be the father of low-
temperature physics in Germany.
Upon Meißner’s appointment he
was already a famous scientist
due to the discovery of the so-
called Meißner-Ochsenfeld-Effect
in 1933 (a magnetic field is
always expelled from the interior

Walther Meißner

206

of a superconducting material).
During Meißner’s directorship, the
focus of the institute shifted more
towards physics at lowest tem-
peratures including the develop-
ment of the necessary cooling
and measurement principles.
The Physikalisch-Technische
Reichsanstalt in Berlin was de-
stroyed during the war and the
Bavarian government was forced
to set up its own institute of this
kind which was affiliated to the

Institut of Technische Physik

1946. Walther Meißner was presi-
dent of the

Bayerische

Akademie der Wissenschaften

between 1946 and 1950. At his
initiative the low-temperature
physics division was separated
and established as a new com-
mission and institute of the
Academy in Herrsching in 1946.
The most important scientific
result of this institute was the dis-
covery of magnetic fluxoid quanti-
zation by

Robert Doll

(*1923) and

Martin Näbauer

(1910 - 1962) in

1961. This result was the essen-
tial experimental support for the
new theory of superconductivity,
the so-called BCS-theory.
Meanwhile this institute became
known as the Walther Meißner
Institut and since 1966 it has
been located at the Garching

research campus in close proxim-
ity to the physics department. Its
directors are also faculty mem-
bers of the department.

As mentioned already, Heinz

Maier-Leibnitz

(1911 - 2000), a

nuclear physicist from university
of Heidelberg, took over the

Institut für Technische Physik

1952, after the retirement of
Walther Meißner. This completed
the transition from the technical
physics of the 19th century, when
the main focus had been on ther-
modynamics, to the technical
physics of the 20th century in
which nuclear physics served as
the technical basis for atomic
energy, but also nuclear methods
were used in many different
areas, solid state physics in par-
ticular. Maier-Leibnitz took the ini-
tiative for the construction of a
nuclear reactor with the vision to
use neutrons as a versatile tool
for multiple interdisciplinary
research. The

Forschungsreaktor München

(FRM), popularly called

Atomei

“atom-egg”, because of its egg-
shaped roof, was built in 1956 in
Garching in the north of Munich.
It became operational in 1957 and
was the seed for the development
of the whole Garching research
campus. The construction of this
neutron source in Garching in
such a short time was made pos-
sible by the fact that the interests
of physics and politics met here
in a very rare but fortunate cir-

Heinz Maier-Leibnitz

cumstance. The scientific output
was immediately very impressive
and within only a few years many
novel instruments and new meas-
urement techniques were devel-
oped. The Garching

Atomei

became very soon an internation-
ally well-known landmark in
physics. The developed know-
how was exported to other initia-
tives for example to the construc-
tion of the European neutron
source in Grenoble. The contribu-
tions and initiatives of Maier-
Leibnitz were here essential as
well, and from 1967 until 1972 he
was the first director of the
Grenoble high flux neutron source
(ILL). Applied nuclear physics,

especially its application to solid
state physics became a highlight
of research in Garching and was
one of the few areas in natural
sciences where the forefront was
in Europe during those post-war
years. It was also the far-sighted-
ness of Maier-Leibnitz to realize
that the physics at THM had to
be reorganized and expanded
which finally led to the foundation
of the

Physik-Department

in the

mid-sixties. A first major expan-
sion of the scope was obtained
with the appointment of

Nikolaus

Riehl

(1901 - 1990), after coming

207

Campus Garching 1957 showing the

Forschungsreaktor Munich I,

also called “Atomei”

208

back to Germany from the Soviet
Union in 1955. He was a well-
known expert in the purification of
uranium and contributed starting
in 1957 to the construction of the
FRM. In 1961 he became full pro-
fessor for technical physics and
concentrated his research activi-
ties on solid state physics, espe-
cially the physics of ice and opti-
cal spectroscopy of solids.

The third institute from which the

Physik-Department

originated

was the

Institut für Theoretische

Physik

which was founded in

1943. Already a year prior

Friedrich Sauter

was appointed

on a personal professorship,
coming from Königsberg.

Josef

Lense

(1890 - 1957) temporarily

took over the institute at the end
of the war until

Gerhard Hettner

(1892 - 1968) was appointed per-
manently in 1947. His area of
research covered quantum statis-
tics, thermodynamics, solid-state
physics, molecular optics, mag-
neto-hydrodynamics and theoreti-
cal plasma physics. When

Wilhelm Brenig

(*1930) succeed-

ed Hettner in 1961, a second the-
oretical professorship was creat-
ed for

Wolfgang Wild

(*1930,

appointed also in 1961). Brenig
was working mainly on theoretical

solid state physics and Wild on
theoretical nuclear and particle
physics. Wolfgang Wild later
became president of TUM and
Bavarian minister of science and
art.

In the same year, 1961,

Rudolf L.

Mößbauer

(*1929), a former stu-

dent of Maier-Leibnitz at THM,
received the Nobel Prize for his
discovery of recoil-free emission
and absorption of Gamma radia-
tion in solids (Mößbauer Effect),
which led to numerous applica-
tions in solid state physics, chem-
istry, biophysics, medicine and
archeology. During this period
Mößbauer worked at the
California Institute of Technology
in Pasadena. In order to bring him
back to Munich, Maier-Leibnitz
took the initiative and together
with his colleagues the professors
Brenig, Riehl and Wild he pro-
posed in a memorandum in 1962
the establishment of a

Physik-

Department

. Rudolf Mößbauer

accepted the offer of the Bavarian
Government to return from the
U.S. in 1964 under the condition
that the physics department be
created.

The

Physik-Department

was offi-

cially founded on January 1,
1965, replacing the three former
independent institutes, but now
with ten full professors with the
necessary endorsement. In addi-
tion to Brenig (retired 1996),
Maier-Leibnitz (retired 1979),

Rudolf L. Mößbauer

Mößbauer (retired 1997), Riehl
(retired 1969) and Wild (retired
1987), three further professor-
ships were created in 1964.

Wolfgang Kaiser

(*1925, retired

1993) brought the new field of
Laser physics and time resolved
spectroscopy from the United
States,

Edgar Lüscher

(1925 -

1990) widened the expertise in
condensed matter physics until
his sudden death in 1990, and

Hans-Jörg Mang

(*1931, retired

1992) was working in nuclear
physics as theoretician.

Klaus

Dransfeld

(*1926) and

Paul

Kienle

(*1933, retired 1999) were

appointed in 1965. They further
expanded the scope of con-
densed matter physics as well as
nuclear and elementary particle
physics. Dransfeld left the
Department in 1974 to become
director at the Max-Planck-Institut
für Festkörperforschung in
Stuttgart and Grenoble. Following
the foundation of the Physics
Department, the scope of physics
at TUM developed rapidly from
nuclear solid state physics into
nuclear, laser, condensed matter,
and semiconductor physics. A
new department building was
constructed in the direct neigh-
borhood of the FRM and most of
the physics groups moved to
Garching around 1970. Nuclear
and particle physics received an
additional push in 1968 with the
appointments of

Herbert Daniel

(*1926, retired 1994) and

Haruhiko Morinaga

(*1923,

retired 1991) and with the installa-
tion of the Tandem-Accelerator in
1970, a facility run jointly by the
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität
and the TUM in Garching up to
today. Solid state physics was
strengthened by

Michael Kalvius

(*1933, appointed 1970, retired
2001) and

Georg Alefeld

(1933 -

1995, appointed 1971). Alefeld
initiated the Bavarian Center for
Applied Energy Science (ZAE)
before his early death in 1995. In
a similar way theoretical physics
was expanded with

Heinz Bilz

209

(1926 -1986), appointed for a
short time from 1969 until 1971
before he became director at the
newly founded MPI für
Festkörperforschung in Stuttgart,

Hartwig Schmidt

(*1935) who

worked here from 1969 until
1978, after which he moved to
the university of Hamburg, and

Pierre C. Hohenberg (

*1934),

who joined the physics depart-
ment in 1974 but returned to Bell
Laboratories in 1977.

Memorandum proposed 1962 by Brenig, Riehl, Wild and Maier-Leibnitz to establish a
Physics Department in Garching

210

The large Physics Department
with relatively small groups turned
out to be very flexible in reacting
to new developments and subse-
quently various new directions
were picked up during the past
30 years such as astro-particle
physics, surface and interface
physics, superconductivity, semi-
conductor physics, energy sci-
ence and last but not least bio-
physics. This was made possible
in part by finding appropriate suc-
cessors after retirement or by
splitting and expanding certain
areas of research. Some of the
colleagues who were appointed in
the 70’s and 80’s are already
retired as well. These are

Wolfgang Gläser

(*1933,

appointed 1974, retired 2001) the
“father” of the new neutron
source FRM-II,

Klaus Andres

(*1934, appointed 1980, retired
1999) the director of the Walther-
Meissner-Institut for low tempera-
ture physics,

Hans-Joachim

Körner

(*1934, appointed 1974,

retired 2002), whose main interest
is in applied nuclear physics and

Klaus Dietrich

(*1934, appointed

1972, retired 2002) whose area of
research is related to theoretical
nuclear physics.

The wide spectrum of scientific
activities and the high internation-
al reputation of the Physics
Department were only made pos-
sible by the many contributions of
motivated scientists, directed by

various assistant and associate
professors. Among those is also

Klaus von Klitzing

(*1943), who

was professor at the Department
from 1980 shortly after his dis-
covery of the Quantum Hall
Effect, until 1984, when he took
up a directorship at Max-Planck-
Institut für Festkörperforschung in
Stuttgart. Semiconductor physics
experienced an additional push
when von Klitzing received the
Nobel Prize in 1985. The

Walter

Schottky Institut

for basic and

applied research in semiconduc-
tor physics (WSI) was founded as
a central institute of TUM in 1987,
based on proposals by

Frederick

Koch

and

Gerhard Abstreiter

Physics Department building shortly before inauguration, 1969

1985. It became operational in
1988, after a construction period
of only 18 months, in close prox-
imity to the Physics Department.
Two of the three newly created
professorships belong to physics,
one to electrical engineering,
bridging the gap between basic
physics and semiconductor
devices.

Erich Gornik

(*1944)

was appointed at WSI from 1988
until he moved to TU Vienna in
1992 as well as

Günter Weimann

(*1940) who left in 1995 to direct
a Fraunhofer-Institut in Freiburg.

In the 90’s the physics depart-
ment was further expanded by
the constructions of

Physik II

, an

extension of the Physics
Department, the

Bayerisches

Zentrum für Angewandte
Energieforschung

(ZAE), and

finally the new neutron source

Forschungsreaktor München II

(FRM-II) which is expected to
become operational in the year
2003. The Atomei has stopped its
nuclear operation in 2000 in order
to get prepared for the new task
at FRM- II.

Various

Max-Planck-Insitutes

were founded in the neighbor-
hood of the physics department
during the past 40 years, dealing

211

with plasma physics and fusion,
astro and extraterrestrial physics
as well as quantum optics. There
were always close relations and
collaborations between these
institutes and physics at TUM.
Together with these facilities, the
Garching research campus has
developed to one of the largest
centers for pure and applied
physics world-wide.

In connection with the reformation
of Universities (Hochschulreform)
the

Physik-Department

was for-

mally organized as

Fakultät für

Physik

with three institutes in the

80’s. The daily work in science
and teaching, however, always
incorporated the idea and the
spirit of a Department.
Furthermore, a reorganization into
a department structure has taken
place in 1997. Nowadays, the

Physik-Department

consists of

22 chairs and a total of about 35
to 40 professors.

The history of physics at TUM is
characterized by the fast develop-
ment of physics in general, espe-
cially in the past fifty years. It can
be proud of the high quality of
teaching which is documented
also by the many textbooks for
physics and engineering physics
written by members of the
department and is also reflected
by the recent Nobel Prizes for its

former students

Johann

Deisenhofer

(chemistry 1988),

Erwin Neher

(medicine 1991) and

Wolfgang Ketterle

(physics

2001). The prizes for chemistry
and medicine demonstrate that
interdisciplinary research is
essential for many important
achievements nowadays. Physics
at TUM has been always charac-
terized by its interaction and
cooperation with other disci-
plines, also in the tradition of

Carl

von Linde

, who realized early the

importance of physics for the
engineering sciences. The spatial
separation, however, often made
this interaction difficult in the past
decades. The recent expansion of
the Garching research campus
hopefully will have a positive influ-
ence on future interdisciplinary
research. Physics will be an
important discipline in natural sci-
ences in the 21st century as well,
and will be essential for the future
development and understanding
of many problems. The

Physik-

Department

of TUM is ready to

master these challenges.

Gerhard Abstreiter