Science & Mathematics - Overview
The Museum's collections hold thousands of objects related to chemistry, biology, physics, astronomy, and other sciences. Instruments range from early American telescopes to lasers. Rare glassware and other artifacts from the laboratory of Joseph Priestley, the discoverer of oxygen, are among the scientific treasures here. A Gilbert chemistry set of about 1937 and other objects testify to the pleasures of amateur science. Artifacts also help illuminate the social and political history of biology and the roles of women and minorities in science.
The mathematics collection holds artifacts from slide rules and flash cards to code-breaking equipment. More than 1,000 models demonstrate some of the problems and principles of mathematics, and 80 abstract paintings by illustrator and cartoonist Crockett Johnson show his visual interpretations of mathematical theorems.
"Science & Mathematics - Overview" showing 51 items.
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Watson and Crick Metal Base Pair from Model
- Description
- This is one of four brass templates illustrating the base pairings of adenine and thymine or cytosine and guanine, from Francis Crick's and James Watson's original model of the "double helix" of DNA. Two templates show the correct base pair shapes; two others are earlier, misconceived models. Watson and Crick's story of discovery is well told in James Watson's The Double Helix, including the moment they put together the first correct model. A key clue for matching the correct forms of adenine and thymine or guanine and cytosine came from American crystallographer Jerry Donohue, who worked in the same laboratory as Watson and Crick. After the double helix research was published in Nature, generating tremendous worldwide notoriety, Donohue kept the model templates as souvenirs. Later, he returned to the United States, taking a position at the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia. Shortly before his death, Donohue gave the templates to his friend and fellow crystallographer, Dr. Helen Berman, who presented them to the Smithsonian in 1988.
- Location
- Currently on loan
- Date made
- 1953
- originator
- Crick, Francis
- Watson, James
- maker
- Cavendish Laboratory
- ID Number
- 1988.0494.01
- accession number
- 1988.0494
- catalog number
- 1988.0494.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Suan-p'an, or Chinese Abacus
- Description
- This instrument has an open wooden frame held together with brass nails passing through metal bands. A wooden cross bar holds 13 columns of beads. Each column has two beads above the crossbar and five beads below. The beads are rounded, as on other Chinese abaci. There are no marks by a maker.
- This form of abacus was sold in combination with a book entitled Abacus Arithmetic by the Australian-born metallurgist, Stanford University graduate, and later Stanford professor of metallurgy Welton J. Crook (1886-1976). Crook became fascinated with the abacus on a visit to Hong Kong, and resolved to publish a clear exposition on the instrument in English. His short book was published in 1958 by Pacific Books in Palo Alto, California, and sold tens of thousands of copies. For a copy of this paperback, see 1989.0709.03. The abacus and the related book were given to the Smithsonian by Washington, D. C., clockmaker Elton L. Howe in 1989.
- On Crook, see: Stanford University Faculty Memorials, “Memorial Resolution Welton J. Crook (1886-1976)," digitized by the Stanford Historical Society .
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1958
- ID Number
- 1989.0709.01
- catalog number
- 1989.0709.01
- accession number
- 1989.0709
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
The First Atomic-Beam Clock
- Description
- The remarkable advances in electronics and microwave technology made during World War II stimulated the physicists who had worked on them to imagine new applications after the war for peacetime conditions. An outstanding example is the cesium-beam frequency standard, one of several types of "atomic clock" developed in the postwar years.
- This is the experimental instrument built under the supervision of Jerrold Zacharias at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1954. It showed that the atomic beam principle was feasible as a technique for extremely precise timekeeping, and paved the way immediately for a commercial version closely modeled on it.
- The idea on which it relied had been known for two decades. The American physicist I. I. Rabi had applied it in the late 1930s to precise measurements of the magnetic moments and "spins" of nuclei of various kinds of atoms. Rabi knew that atoms behave as tiny magnets: a beam of them, traveling in a vacuum, can be deflected slightly by passing through a non-uniform magnetic field.
- Furthermore, the strength of the atomic magnet, and its direction relative to that of the magnetic field, can be altered by microwaves whose frequency exactly matches (is in resonance with) a frequency characteristic of the atoms used in the experiment. Rabi's apparatus detected the change in deflection of the atomic beam when this resonance occurred.
- In 1953, Zacharias, who as a graduate student had collaborated in Rabi's prewar experiments, started vigorous work on making such an atomic-beam apparatus function as a clock. By the next summer, he and his student R. D. Haun, assisted by visiting researcher J. G. Yates, were able to make the atomic vibrations of a cesium beam control a crystal oscillator, whose frequency then became as precise as that of the cesium atoms. This oscillator frequency in turn could be used for timekeeping far more precise than any previously possible.
- The device shown is the atomic beam portion, the heart of the system, which was enclosed in a tall vacuum chamber when in use. Cesium atoms boiled out of an oven near the bottom and formed a beam, which passed a deflecting magnet, and then traversed a space in which it was subjected to the oscillating microwave field. It then passed a second deflecting magnet, which served to bring the atoms to a focus, as in Rabi's method, on a detector. This determined any deviation from resonance and sent a signal to circuits which adjusted the microwave frequency accordingly.
- Zacharias's apparatus is noteworthy for being designed as a prototype for an instrument intended to be sold commercially. Unlike the traditional horizontal atomic beam apparatus, this one stood compactly vertical. It used permanent magnets rather than electromagnets; had convenient connections for vacuum pump, electronics, and microwaves; and had an oven designed to run for a long time without stopping. Zacharias persuaded the National Company, a manufacturer of radio equipment in nearby Malden, Mass., to take on the task of developing a commercial version under his supervision. After overcoming many difficulties, they began delivering the "Atomichron" in the autumn of 1956, mainly to military laboratories. Despite its high cost, $50,000, it sold well to those laboratories, and the Signal Corps declared that it "performed well beyond all expectations."
- Reference: Paul Forman, "'Atomichron': The Atomic Clock from Concept to Commercial Product," Proceedings of the IEEE, Vol. 73, No. 7, July 1985, pp. 1811-1204.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1955
- maker
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- ID Number
- EM*319767
- catalog number
- 319767
- accession number
- 254080
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Replica of a Babylonian Clay Tablet - Plimpton 322
- Description
- Both written language and written tables originated in the ancient Middle East. Scribes kept lists of numerical data, such as the number of sheep and goats transferred on different days of the month. A few of the clay tablets on which they wrote survive to this day. A tiny number of these tablets have rows and columns arranged in tables.. The rows may give totals of number of various forms of livestock transferred over time, with a column for the animals that were the responsibility of each person charged with such matters. Such documents date from around 2020 BCE.
- Those learning and teaching mathematics in ancient Iraq rarely displayed information in tabular form. However, in 1922 the American collector George Plimpton purchased such a tablet. This replica of that unusual object was made in 1957 by L. C. Eichner. Plimpton donated the original object to Columbia University in the 1920s. The original dates from about 1800 BCE, and reportedly was excavated in what is now Iraq at the side of the ancient city of Lasra. The portion of the tablet that survives has four columns of numbers written in the sexagesimal (base 60) system of numbers.
- Otto Neugebauer and A. J. Sachs offered a modern mathematical interpretation of the tablet in 1945. They noted that the numbers in the second and third columns of the table might represent the squares of the length of the shortest side and of the hypotenuse of right triangles, and interpreted the table as relating to Pythagorean triples. As the name Pythagorean suggests, such numbers had previously only been associated with later Greek mathematics. Other scholars have suggested that this was a part of a larger table of reciprocal numbers and related geometric figures, compiled by a teacher wishing to have examples of such reciprocals available for use in assignments.
- References:
- A. Aaboe, Episodes from the Early History of Mathematics, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1964, pp. 30–31.
- O. Neugebauer and A. J. Sachs, Mathematical Cuneiform Texts, New Haven: American Oriental Society and American Schools of Oriental Research, 1945.
- O. Neugebauer, The Exact Sciences in Antiquity, Providence, R.I.: Brown University Press,1957, pp. 36–40 and Plate 7a.
- E. Robson, “Neither Sherlock Holmes nor Babylon: A Reassessment of Plimpton 322,” Historia Mathematica, 28 (2001), pp. 167–206.
- E. Robson, “Words and Pictures: New Light on Plimpton 322,” American Mathematical Monthly, 109 (Feb 2002), pp. 105–120.
- E. Robson, “Tables and Tabular Formatting in Babylon and Assyria, 2500 BCE–50 CE,” The History of Mathematical Tables from Sumer to Spreadsheets, eds. M. Campbell-Kelly, M. Croarken, R. Flood and E. Robson, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003, pp. 18–47.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1957
- maker
- L. C. Eichner Instruments
- ID Number
- MA*315226
- catalog number
- 315226
- accession number
- 218473
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Tchoty, or Russian Abacus
- Description
- This modern Russian abacus has a black plastic frame and 13 parallel metal wires that hold beads. There are ten beads on each rod, with two blue ones in the middle and four white ones on either side. On the third and sixth row, the leftmost bead is also blue. The fourth row from the bottom has only four beads - two blue ones in the center and a white bead on either side.
- The cardboard envelope is yellow, red, and tan, with a drawing of the abacus. The envelope is marked in pencil: MOSCOW (/) Sept. 1958 (/) G.U.M. Other marks on it are in Russian.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1958
- ID Number
- MA*335269
- catalog number
- 335269
- accession number
- 314637
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Soroban, or Japanese Abacus
- Description
- This abacus has an open wooden frame painted black and a wooden cross piece with an inset white strip on top. Twenty-three parallel wooden rods hold the beads. On each rod, there is one bead above the cross piece and four below. The beads are similar in shape to those on other Japanese abaci. Every third column of beads is marked with a black dot on the cross piece. The central column has two black dots and a red dot as well. Every fifth column is marked with a white dot. The abacus is stored in a cardboard box covered with decorated paper. There is no mark of a maker.
- The instrument was given to the Smithsonian by G. Norman Albree, along with several circular slide rules of his design. According to the donor, his first introduction to the soroban was in 1958. He found addition and subtraction straightforward and bought this larger instrument to try multiplication and division. However, the beads were too small for his seventy-year-old fingers and thumb. Albree put the instrument aside, and returned to using logarithmic tables for multiplication and division.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1959
- ID Number
- MA*335485
- catalog number
- 335485
- accession number
- 321674
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Felsenthal FAE-19A Artillery Protractor
- Description
- While many protractors simply measure angles in degrees, others have been adapted for more specialized contexts. For instance, they may be combined with other drawing instruments, such as rulers or templates for flow chart components. Or, they may make measurements in other scales for angles, such as radians. Before computerized and satellite navigation equipment was in wide use, protractors were employed in military applications, including positioning artillery.
- Thus, this clear plastic protractor, which is in the shape of a sixth-circle, permitted the user to plot the distance traveled by a projectile from the time that elapsed before the sound of the projectile was heard. The outer edge of the protractor's arc is divided by hundredths and marked by tenths from +3.4 to +0.1 (in black print) and from -0.1 to -3.4 (in red print). The scale is labeled: TIME INTERVAL, SECONDS and MIDPOINTS FOR 4-SECOND SUB-BASE, 1/25000.
- A scale marked DEGREES is further inside the arc. It is divided by minutes and marked by fives from 55° to 0°. Finally, a scale for MILS is divided by tens and marked by hundreds from 1000 to 100. 1000 mils is equivalent to 56.25°. A scale for THOUSANDS OF YARDS 1/25000 is along the right edge of the protractor. It is divided by five-hundredths and marked by ones from 14 to 1.
- The maker's mark is near the vertex: 4 SOUND SECONDS (/) FELSENTHAL INSTRUMENTS CO. (/) MFR'S PART NO. FAE-19A (/) MFR'S CODE 22040.
- The Felsenthal Instruments Company was the leading supplier of mathematical instruments to the U.S. Army Air Force and the U.S. Navy Bureau of Aeronautics, particularly during World War II (when the firm was known as G. Felsenthal & Sons). After the company ceased operations in approximately 1976, it provided a large sample of its products to the Smithsonian.
- See also 1977.1141.02, 1977.1141.03, 1977.1141.05, 1977.1141.08, 1977.1141.09, 1977.1141.10, 1977.1141.11, 1977.1141.12, 1977.1141.18, 1977.1141.19, 1977.1141.20, 1977.1141.21, 1977.1141.22, 1977.1141.23, 1977.1141.24, 1977.1141.30, and 1977.1141.39.
- Reference: Deborah J. Warner, “Browse by Maker: Felsenthal,” National Museum of American History Physical Sciences Collection: Navigation, http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/navigation/maker.cfm?makerid=173.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date attributed by donor
- 1950
- date made
- 1970s
- maker
- Felsenthal Instrument Co.
- ID Number
- 1977.1141.01
- accession number
- 1977.1141
- catalog number
- 336385
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Felsenthal FAE-19B Artillery Protractor
- Description
- This clear plastic sixth-circle protractor is divided along its outer edge by hundredths and marked by tenths from +1.7 to +0.1 (in black print) and from -0.1 to -3.4 (in red print). The scale is labeled: TIME INTERVAL, SECONDS. The left edge of the protractor is divided by tens and marked by hundreds from 2000 to 600. The scale is labeled: LENGTH OF SUB-BASE, YARDS. The right edge of the protractor is divided by halves and marked by ones from 14 to 1. The scale is labeled: THOUSANDS OF YARDS (/) 1/25000.
- The interior of the protractor is filled with diagonal lines. Three scales are among the diagonal lines, each numbered by tenths in black and in red print. The outermost is numbered from 3.9 to 0.1; the middle scale is numbered from 3.0 to 0.1; and the innermost is numbered from 2.2 to 0.1.
- The maker's mark is near the vertex, which is notched: 2 SOUND SECONDS (/) TEMPLATE, 1/25000 (/) FELSENTHAL INSTRUMENTS CO. (/) MFR'S PART NO. FAE-19B (/) MFR'S CODE 22040. There is a large plus sign to the right of the maker's mark.
- The Chicago firm that manufactured this protractor was known as Felsenthal Instruments Co. in the 1960s and 1970s. Ben Wharton Rau (1904–1995) and his wife, Margery Felsenthal Rau (1916–2010), arranged the donation of this object and many other instruments to the Smithsonian. Margery's father, Irving (1887–1956), was one of the "Sons" of G. Felsenthal & Sons, as the company was known in the 1940s and 1950s. Margery's grandfather, Gabe Felsenthal, founded the firm in 1899.
- Ben Rau worked for the Felsenthals. His duties included touring military facilities with a large display of the company's products. He catalogued hundreds of instruments when the company went out of business in 1976. He dated this protractor and 1977.1141.01 to 1950. While the form was indeed probably older, the maker's name on the instrument indicates it was manufactured in the 1960s or 1970s. Rau also held patents on a collapsible film reel, a proportional divider, and a belt buckle assembly.
- See also 1977.1141.01, 1977.1141.03, 1977.1141.05, 1977.1141.08, 1977.1141.09, 1977.1141.10, 1977.1141.11, 1977.1141.12, 1977.1141.18, 1977.1141.19, 1977.1141.20, 1977.1141.21, 1977.1141.22, 1977.1141.23, 1977.1141.24, 1977.1141.30, and 1977.1141.39.
- References: Deborah J. Warner, “Browse by Maker: Felsenthal,” National Museum of American History Physical Sciences Collection: Navigation, http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/navigation/maker.cfm?makerid=173; "Irving G. Felsenthal," Chicago Tribune, February 26, 1956, http://www.susaneking.com/genealogy/showsource.php?sourceID=S01752&tree=GreenebaumSam; Copyright Office, Library of Congress, "Books and Pamphlets," Catalog of Copyright Entries, 3rd ser., 16, part 1, no. 2 (1964): 1392; Ben W. Rau, "Collapsible Film Reel" (U.S. Patent 3,447,759 issued June 3, 1969), "Proportional Divider" (U.S. Patent D214,399 issued June 10, 1969), "Belt Buckle Assembly" (U.S. Patent 3,475,797 issued November 4, 1969).
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date attributed by donor
- 1950
- date made
- 1970s
- maker
- Felsenthal Instrument Co.
- ID Number
- 1977.1141.02
- accession number
- 1977.1141
- catalog number
- 336386
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Felsenthal FAE-9 Protractor
- Description
- This clear plastic rectangular protractor is divided by single degrees and marked by tens from 10° to 170° and from 190° to 350°. Pinholes near the 20° and 60° marks allow for positioning the protractor. The bottom edge is divided by tenths of an inch and marked by ones from 1" to 5". The interior of the protractor contains three scales of equal parts: 1) divided by hundreds and marked by five hundreds from 0 to 2,500 yards, for a scale of 1/20,000; 2) divided by hundreds and marked by thousands from 0 to 7,000 yards, for a scale of 1/62,500; and 3) divided by hundreds and marked by five hundreds from 0 to 2,000 meters, for a scale of 1/20,000. There are verniers to the left of the first and third scales.
- Near the top of the protractor is marked: U.S. 1951. The 1951 is believed to refer to the date of the object. The maker's mark is: G. FELSENTHAL & SONS, INC. (/) PART NO. FAE-9.
- This protractor is almost exactly like 1977.1141.09. See also 1977.1141.01, 1977.1141.02, 1977.1141.03, 1977.1141.05, 1977.1141.10, 1977.1141.11, 1977.1141.12, 1977.1141.18, 1977.1141.19, 1977.1141.20, 1977.1141.21, 1977.1141.22, 1977.1141.23, 1977.1141.24, 1977.1141.30, and 1977.1141.39.
- Reference: Deborah J. Warner, “Browse by Maker: Felsenthal,” National Museum of American History Physical Sciences Collection: Navigation, http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/navigation/maker.cfm?makerid=173.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date attributed by donor
- 1951
- maker
- G. Felsenthal & Sons, Inc.
- ID Number
- 1977.1141.08
- accession number
- 1977.1141
- catalog number
- 336392
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Felsenthal FAE-9A Artillery Protractor
- Description
- This clear plastic rectangular protractor is divided by single degrees and marked by tens from 10° to 170° and from 190° to 350°. Pinholes near the 20° and 60° marks allow for positioning the protractor. The bottom edge is divided by tenths of an inch and marked by ones from 1" to 5". The interior of the protractor contains three scales of equal parts: 1) divided by hundreds and marked by five hundreds from 0 to 2,500 yards, for a scale of 1/20,000; 2) divided by hundreds and marked by thousands from 0 to 7,000 yards, for a scale of 1/62,500; and 3) divided by hundreds and marked by five hundreds from 0 to 2,000 meters, for a scale of 1/20,000. There are verniers to the left of the first and third scales.
- Near the top of the protractor is marked: U.S. 1957. The 1957 is believed to refer to the date of the object. The maker's mark is: G. FELSENTHAL & SONS, INC. (/) PART NO. FAE-9A.
- This protractor is almost exactly like 1977.1141.08. See also 1977.1141.01, 1977.1141.02, 1977.1141.03, 1977.1141.05, 1977.1141.10, 1977.1141.11, 1977.1141.12, 1977.1141.18, 1977.1141.19, 1977.1141.20, 1977.1141.21, 1977.1141.22, 1977.1141.23, 1977.1141.24, 1977.1141.30, and 1977.1141.39.
- Reference: Deborah J. Warner, “Browse by Maker: Felsenthal,” National Museum of American History Physical Sciences Collection: Navigation, http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/navigation/maker.cfm?makerid=173.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date attributed by donor
- 1957
- maker
- G. Felsenthal & Sons, Inc.
- ID Number
- 1977.1141.09
- accession number
- 1977.1141
- catalog number
- 336393
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
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