Biographical Memoirs Volume 87 (2005) / Chapter Skim
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Hans E. Suess
Hans E. Suess
Pages 354-373
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From page 355... ...
The book has been translated from German into all the major languages. Aside from his work as a scientist, Eduard Suess was engaged in politics and became the first member of the City Council of Vienna and later on a member of the Austrian Parliament.
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From page 356... ...
He received in his young years a good intuition as to what could be right and what probably was wrong. In his acceptance speech for the Leonard Medal of the Meteoritical Society, he said, "When I was a little boy, I was told all about continental drift and plate tectonics, and how mountains were folded asymmetrically.
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From page 357... ...
The papers of Hans Suess dealing with the cosmic abundances of elements played a fundamental role in the physical explanation of "magic numbers." These numbers not only showed up in the cosmic abundances but also in various properties of the nuclei like the binding energy or the neutron absorption cross-sections. At that point the topic became more a problem of nuclear physics.
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From page 358... ...
Nuclei with smaller mass numbers have a weak spin-orbit coupling, and the corresponding shells follow the energy levels given by the orbital momenta. For mass numbers higher than 20 the spin-orbit coupling becomes dominant, and the energy levels are governed by the total angular momenta.
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From page 359... ...
Suess stated that the ratio of the number of xenon atoms in the atmosphere to the number of silicon atoms in the bulk earth is about 107 times smaller on the Earth than in the universe, whereas for neon this figure exceeds 1011. He further found that abundances of Ne, Ar-36 and Ar-38, Kr and Xe follow an exponential function suggesting loss to space by selective diffusion and stated that a proof could be obtained by studying the isotopic ratios of neon and argon, as the lighter isotopes should be preferentially lost leading to a decrease in the neon-20/neon-22 and argon-36/argon-38 ratios.
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From page 360... ...
Hans Suess was fortunate as a member of such a dynasty. Both his grandfather Eduard Suess and his father Franz Eduard Suess were distinguished earth scientists in their day.
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From page 361... ...
In Libby's laboratory the samples for C-14 dating were prepared for counting by converting their carbon content to solid carbon, which was inserted in counters designed for their measurement. All but one of the early users of the method followed his procedures in detail.
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From page 362... ...
His early results came mainly from samples of wood collected from locations in the northern U.S. states, usually found as stumps or logs knocked over by the advancing ice sheet.
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From page 363... ...
With the improvements in analytical techniques and progress in understanding the structure of the sun and other stars, improved chemical abundance data were becoming available. A paper by Suess and Harold Urey (1956)
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From page 364... ...
The Suess-Revelle paper was, however, the only one of the three to stress the growing quantity of CO2 contributed by our burning of fossil fuel, and to call attention to the fact that it might cause global warming over time. This was later mentioned in the prize awarded to Revelle as the effect became visible.
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From page 365... ...
The purpose was to gather data that could be used to shed light on the movement and mixing of ocean water on a wide scale. The techniques for gathering seawater samples, and extracting the CO2 from them onboard ship, while avoiding contamination or loss, had to be developed first.
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From page 366... ...
, there was a measurable increase in the flux of cosmic rays entering the Earth's atmosphere, making C-14 ages in this period significantly too young. Suess undertook to extend this work backward in time, using overlapping tree samples made available by experts in Arizona and in Europe.
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From page 367... ...
He was very much interested in the terms that others used to characterize particular phenomena. For example, at one period the leading students of rare gases embedded in stone or iron meteorites called one component "primordial rare gases." He saw that the word "primordial," meaning "present from the beginning," implied a model for which the evidence was weak, or even nonexistent.
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From page 368... ...
" There was no good answer. Though his later scientific work was carried out almost entirely in the United States, he maintained close ties with friends in Europe.
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From page 369... ...
1962. Thermodynamic data on the formation of solid carbon and organic compounds in primitive planetary atmospheres.
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From page 370... ...
2a:604. 1949 Die Häufigkeit der Edelgase auf der Erde und im Kosmos.
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From page 371... ...
Wänke. Radiocarbon content and terrestrial age of twelve stony meteorites and one iron meteorite.
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From page 372... ...
20:293-314. 1971 Bristlecone pine calibration of the radiocarbon time scale 5300 B.C.
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