The Electron: Its Isolation and Measurement and the Determination of Some of its Properties

Abstract

THE great advances in physical science that have been made during the past twenty years have been largely based on the idea that electricity, like matter, is not infinitely divisible, but that there exists a definite fundamental unit of electrical charge or “atom of electricity” which is incapable of further subdivision, and that all charges, however great, are integral multiples of this unit. While the great mass of experimental observation strongly supported this idea, it has been extremely difficult, as in the case of so many fundamental theories, to obtain a direct and convincing proof of its truth.

The Electron: Its Isolation and Measurement and the Determination of Some of its Properties.

By Prof. R. A. Millikan. (University of Chicago Science Series.) Pp. xii + 268. (Chicago, 111.: University of Chicago Press; London: Cambridge University Press., 1917.) Price 1.50 dollars net.