Isidor Isaac Rabi
American physicist (1898–1988)
Who was Isidor Isaac Rabi?
Isidor Isaac Rabi lived from July 29, 1898 to January 11, 1988. Born into a traditional Polish-Jewish family in Rymanów, Austria-Hungary, Rabi came to the United States as an infant and was raised in New York's Lower East Side. He entered Cornell University as an electrical engineering student in 1916, but soon switched to chemistry. He continued his studies at Columbia University, where he was awarded his doctorate for a thesis on the magnetic susceptibility of certain crystals. Later, he became interested in physics. In 1927, he headed for Europe, where he met and worked with many of the finest physicists of the time. In 1929, Rabi returned to the United States, where Columbia offered him a faculty position.
Historical significance
Israel Isaac "Isidor" Rabi (; Yiddish: איזידאָר יצחק ראַבי, romanized: Izidor Yitzkhok Rabi; July 29, 1898 – January 11, 1988) was an American physicist who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1944 "for his resonance method for recording the magnetic properties of atomic nuclei." He was also one of the first scientists in the United States to work on the cavity magnetron, which is used in microwave radar and microwave ovens.
