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Eugene Paul Wigner: A Biographical Sketch

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Part of the book series: The Collected Works of Eugene Paul Wigner ((2875,volume A / 1))

Abstract

Eugene Paul Wigner (Jenö Pál Wigner) was born in Budapest, Hungary, on 17 November 1902. His father Anthony (Antal) Wigner and mother Elizabeth (Erzsébet) née Einhorn, were both descended from Austrian Jewish families. Anthony’s family originally had the name ‘Wiegner’, meaning ‘candlemaker’, but his grandfather dropped the ‘e’ in the name. Anthony’s father died when he was very young, which made it difficult for him to get a regular education or to have ‘great fantasies for his life, and if he did, he did not share them’. Anthony Wigner became a director in a leather-tanning factory.

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References

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© 1993 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Mehra, J. (1993). Eugene Paul Wigner: A Biographical Sketch. In: Wightman, A.S. (eds) The Collected Works of Eugene Paul Wigner. The Collected Works of Eugene Paul Wigner, vol A / 1. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-02781-3_1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-02781-3_1

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-08154-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-662-02781-3

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