Ettore Majorana: Unveiled Genius and Endless Mysteries (Springer Biographies)

Translation from the Italian language edition: La cattedra vacante © Liguori Editore 2009 "I must thank the following for their collaboration: G. Paparo and L. Rossi from the Italian embassy in Buenos Aires, C.A. Barba from the Museo Postal y Telegrafos—Museo de Telecomunicaciones at the Correo Central in Buenos Aires, Anna Sicolo from the Polo Archivistico Sanitario of Regione Campania (Italy) and Edoardo Giaquinto and Giovanna Paola Perdonà, as well as the staff of several institutions: the Archives of the Accademia delle Scienze detta dei XL in Rome, the State Central Archives in Rome, the Archives of the University of Naples “Federico II”, the Library of the Department of Mathematics “Guido Castelnuovo” of the Sapienza University in Rome, the “Giovanni Spadolini” Library of the Senate of the Republic of Italy, the Deutsches Museum in Munich, ETH in Zurich, Niels Bohr Library, of the American Institute of Physics." Part I The Dostoyevskian Hero 1 An Archimedes from Sicily Studies in Rome. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Music, Books, and Science for a Fine Humourist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 An Engineer’s Career . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Regia Scuola di Applicazione . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Corbino’s Appeal and the School of Physics in Rome . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Fermi Passes an Exam . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Graduation in Physics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 2 A Certain Interest in Pure Science. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 Theoretical Research . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 The “Neutral Proton” and the Turning Point in 1932 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 A Trip to Leipzig . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 Back in Rome . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 Libero docente . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 3 Ten Short Papers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Tidying up the Spectra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Molecular Bonds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 A Formula and a Multifaceted Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 Heisenberg Does Some Promotion (But not Too Much) . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 Infinite Problems for Professor Pauli. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53 Pulling the Neutrino Out of a Hat. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 Something Unexpected . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 Part II Power to the Italian School 4 The 1937 Opportunity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 Majorana Applies for a Chair . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 Young Theoretical Physicists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 vii High and Well-Deserved Repute . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71 Great Expectations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 5 Arrival in Naples. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 The First Three Days . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 Innocent Souls. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 A Mathematician’s Interest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81 75 Days in Naples. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 The Storm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 Part III A Legacy from the Grand Inquisitor 6 The Mystery of the Missing Papers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93 The Director’s Office. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93 The Sidekick, the Assistant, and the Co-ed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95 The Folder Recovered . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97 The Missing Papers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 The Adventures of Eugenio M.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102 7 Fortunes and Misfortunes of a Famous Director . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107 A Devastating Fire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107 Rumours About a Powerful Man. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109 Antonio Carrelli . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111 The Blue Colour of the Heavens. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 The Papers that Were Never Found . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117 Part IV Investigation of a Disappearance 8 Before March 26 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123 A Surprising Coincidence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123 Leaving the Port of Naples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125 A Matter of Money . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126 Clues from the Neapolitan Lectures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128 French Papers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129 9 In Search of a Missing Professor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133 Getting the Search Started. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133 First Enquiries. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135 The Political Police Enters the Scene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137 Pressure from the Ministry of Education. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141 The Religious Lead . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144 A Fictional Interlude . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148 viii Contents 10 The Last Chapter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151 News from Sicily . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151 A Curious Observation, but not Completely Crazy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 Nearing the End of the Enquiries in the Majorana Case . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 A Lead from South America. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159 On the Argentinian Trail . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165 A Careful Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169 Epilogue. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183 Timeline. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 Contents This biography sheds new light on the life and work of physicist Ettore Majorana (including unpublished contributions), as well as on his mysterious disappearance in March 1938. Majorana is held by many, including Nobel Laureate, Enrico Fermi, to have been a genius of the rank of Galilei and Newton. In this intriguing story, the author, himself a leading expert on the work of Majorana, supplements the existing literature with new insights, anecdotes and personal accounts of contemporaries of Majorana.