December 11, 1882 - Birth of Max Born, the man Einstein turned to whenever he had doubts about quantum mechanics

He began his studies at the University of Wroclaw in 1901 and as the university system allowed students to exchange between universities, he spent some semesters at the University of Heidelberg (1902), the University of Zurich (1903), and the University of Götingen (1904) and obtained a doctorate in mathematics and physics.

He had the opportunity to study, work, and collaborate with great scientists of the time such as Joseph J. Thomson (discoverer of the electron) and Albert Einstein.

Possibly his most famous contribution to quantum physics is his probabilistic interpolation of the Schrödinger wave function. According to it, the modulus squared of the amplitude of the Schrödinger wave function is equal to the probability density of state. For example, in the case of a wave function describing the position of an electron, the square of the amplitude will be equal to the probability of finding the electron at a given position.

By the end of 1913, Born had already published 27 papers, and in 1914 he received a letter from Max Planck offering him an extraordinary professorship in theoretical physics at the University of Berlin, which Max Von Laue had turned down.

In 1915 he arrived in Berlin in the middle of the First World War and joined the army's artillery research and development organisation. It was at this time that he formed a rare and close friendship with Albert Einstein that lasted for 40 years, although their views on science were irreconcilable. Einstein turned to him whenever he had doubts about quantum mechanics, and it was to him that he addressed his famous phrase: ‘You believe in a God who plays dice, and I believe in total arrangement’.

In 1918, Planck managed to get Born released from the army, and in the same year, a collaboration with Fritz Haber led to a discussion on how an ionic compound is formed when a metal reacts with a halogen, known today as the Born-Haber cycle.

Even before Born took up the professorship in Berlin, von Laue had changed his mind and decided that he wanted it after all. He arranged with Born and the faculties concerned to exchange jobs. In April 1919, Born became full professor and director of the Institute for Theoretical Physics at the Faculty of Science of the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt. While he was there, the University of Göttingen told him that it was looking for a replacement for Peter Debye as director of the Institute of Physics. On this occasion Einstein advised him: ‘Theoretical physics will flourish wherever you are; there is no other Born to be found in Germany today’. Negotiating for the post with the ministry of education, Born secured another professorship, in experimental physics, in Göttingen for his old friend and colleague James Franck.

In 1954, he shared the Nobel Prize in Physics with Walter Bothe for their work in quantum mechanics.

If you want to know more about this scientist, click here: Max Born