Fermi, Pasta, Ulam, and a Mysterious Lady
Abstract
It is reported that the numerical simulations of the Fermi-Pasta-Ulam problem were performed by a young lady, Mary Tsingou. After 50 years of omission, it is time for a proper recognition of her decisive contribution to the first ever numerical experiment, central in the solitons and chaos theories, but also one of the very first out-of-equilibrium statistical mechanics study. Let us quote from now on the Fermi-Pasta-Ulam-Tsingou problem.
- Publication:
-
Physics Today
- Pub Date:
- 2008
- DOI:
- 10.1063/1.2835154
- arXiv:
- arXiv:0801.1590
- Bibcode:
- 2008PhT....61a..55D
- Keywords:
-
- Physics - History of Physics;
- Condensed Matter - Statistical Mechanics;
- Nonlinear Sciences - Chaotic Dynamics;
- Nonlinear Sciences - Pattern Formation and Solitons;
- Nonlinear Sciences - Exactly Solvable and Integrable Systems
- E-Print:
- Physics Today 61, 1 (2008) 55-57