Jane Dewey facts for kids

Jane Mary Dewey (born July 11, 1900 – died September 19, 1976) was an American physicist. A physicist is a scientist who studies how the universe works, from tiny particles to giant galaxies.

Early Life and Learning

Jane Mary Dewey was born in Chicago. She was the sixth child of John Dewey, a famous thinker, and Alice Chipman Dewey, an educator. Her parents named her after two important women: Jane Addams, who worked to help people, and Mary Rozet Smith, who gave money to good causes.

Jane went to the Ethical Culture School and then the Spence School. After that, she studied at Barnard College and finished her degree in 1922. She then moved to New England to continue her studies. In 1925, she earned a PhD in Physical Chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). A PhD is a very high university degree, showing deep knowledge in a subject. Physical Chemistry is a field that combines physics and chemistry to understand how materials behave.

Her Career

After MIT, Jane Dewey spent two years in Copenhagen, Denmark. She worked as a postdoctoral researcher, which means she was doing advanced research after getting her PhD. She studied a new area called quantum mechanics. This field looks at how tiny particles like atoms behave. She worked with two very famous scientists: Niels Bohr, who had won a Nobel Prize, and Werner Heisenberg, who would later win one too.

Next, she moved to Princeton University. She worked there with Karl Taylor Compton, supported by a special fellowship from the National Research Council. In 1929, she became a teacher at the University of Rochester. She was officially part of the geology department, but she actually worked at the university's Institute of Applied Optics, which studies light and lenses.

In 1931, Dewey became an assistant professor at Bryn Mawr College. That same year, she was chosen as a Fellow of the American Physical Society, a special honor for physicists. Soon after, she became the head of her department. However, her marriage ended, and she became unwell, needing time off. While she was away, Bryn Mawr hired a male physics professor to replace her. Jane Dewey was without a job until 1940, when she found a part-time teaching job at Hunter College.

Her health suddenly improved, and she started working in industry. During World War II, she took a job at the United States Rubber Company. Then, in 1947, she joined the Army's Ballistic Research Laboratory (BRL) at Aberdeen Proving Ground. There, she led the Terminal Ballistics Laboratory. This lab studied what happens when objects hit other things, like bullets hitting targets.

Her Contributions to Science

Dewey-Mackenzie Estimate

While working at the United States Rubber Company, Jane Dewey wrote a very important paper. In it, she figured out the elastic constants of a material. Elastic constants tell us how much a solid material can stretch or bend when force is applied, especially when it has soft particles inside.

In 1950, another scientist named Mackenzie came up with a similar idea for solids that have empty spaces (like tiny holes). Both scientists assumed that the particles or holes were spread out enough that they didn't affect each other. Because of their similar work, ideas like theirs are now called "Dewey-Mackenzie estimates." Mackenzie's solution can be seen as a simpler version of the harder problem that Dewey solved exactly. As of 2021, her paper has been mentioned in other scientific papers over 130 times. Her method is so well known that people often just say "Dewey-Mackenzie estimate" without even needing to mention her original paper.

Slade-Dewey Equation

At the Ballistic Research Laboratory (BRL), Jane Dewey made another important contribution to ballistic science. This is the study of what happens when a projectile (like a bullet) hits something. Her work led to what is now called the Slade-Dewey equation.

This equation helps scientists figure out the critical impact velocity (V_t). This is the speed a projectile needs to hit an explosive or propellant to make it explode. The equation looks like this: V_t = A / √d + B. Here, 'd' is the diameter (width) of the projectile. 'A' and 'B' are special numbers that change depending on the type of explosive.