It was a thesis based on classical physics and as such necessarily failed to explain certain effects. He received his Master's degree from the University of Copenhagen in 1909 and his doctorate in May 1911 for a thesis entitled Studies on the electron theory of metals. With it he won the Gold Medal for 1906 from the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences for his analysis of vibrations of water jets as a means of determining surface tension. This paper is the only one that Bohr wrote describing experiments which he had carried out. I have never known people to be as close as they are. A fellow student wrote of Niels and Harald:. He dictated the paper to his brother Harald. However his father had a physiology laboratory and his first paper describes experimental work in physics which he carried out in that laboratory. Bohr was taught mathematics at university by Thorvald Thiele.Īt university Bohr could not carry out physics experiments since there was no physics laboratory. He had known both of them for many years since they were close friends with his father and had met as part of a regular discussion group, with both brothers Niels and Harald Bohr taking part as soon as they were old enough to contribute. He was taught physics by Christian Christiansen and philosophy by Harald Hoffding. He studied physics as his main subject but took mathematics, astronomy and chemistry as minor subjects. My interest in the study of physics was awakened while I was still in school, largely owing to the influence of my father.īohr studied at the University of Copenhagen which he entered in 1903. It was his father, more than his school teachers, who inspired him in his studies of mathematics and physics. In physics too Bohr studied texts ahead of the class finding errors in them. There is certainly some evidence that he soon realised that the mathematics teacher did not have as good a grasp of the topic as he should have had, and that he became somewhat frightened of his exceptional pupil Bohr. Niels made some good friends while at school but his best friend throughout his life was his brother Harald.ĭuring his last two years at school Niels specialised in mathematics and physics. He was an excellent soccer player, yet not as good as his brother Harald who won a silver medal playing soccer for Denmark. If he really excelled at a subject it was, perhaps surprisingly, physical education. He did well at school without ever being brilliant, usually coming third or fourth in a class of about 20 students. He attended this school, as did his brother Harald, for his complete secondary education taking his Studenterexamen in 1903. In October 1891 Niels entered the Grammelholms school. From their earliest days they were exposed to a world of ideas and discussion, of conflicting views rationally and good-temperedly examined, and they developed a respect for all who seek deeper knowledge and understanding. Niels, Harald, and their older sister, Jenny, grew up in a cultured and stimulating home. When Niels was only a few months old his father Christian had been appointed as a lecturer to fill a post left vacant by the death of Peter Panum, the professor of physiology at the University of Copenhagen, and a short while later the family moved into the Panum's professorial house in Copenhagen. The third child of the family, who went on to become a famous mathematician, was Harald Bohr who was two years younger than Niels. Two years later Niels was born on his mother's 25 th birthday in the same stately home, Ellen again having returned to her mother's house for the birth of her child. Ellen's mother had continued to live in this house after her husband David Adler died in 1878 and Ellen had gone back to her mother's home to have her child. The eldest was Jenny born in 1883 in the mansion which David Adler had owned opposite Christiansborg Castle where the Danish Parliament sat. Late in the same year he married Ellen, who was the daughter of David Adler, a Jewish politician with a high standing in Danish political and commercial life. Christian Bohr was awarded a doctorate in physiology from the University of Copenhagen in 1880 and in 1881 he became a Privatdozent at the university. Biography Niels Bohr's father was Christian Bohr and his mother was Ellen Adler.
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