His name is worth $1.5 billion: The legendary life of a genius boy

On March 15, 2022, Eugene Parker died at the age of 94. Parker became famous for rigorously proving the existence of the solar wind at the age of 30. In his 60-year academic career, he published more than 200 research papers as the sole author, reshaping human understanding of solar physics, plasma physics, and the nature of magnetic fields at all scales. Now, the $1.5 billion "Parker Solar Probe" named after his last name is carrying on his legacy and unlocking the secrets of the sun. Although Parker is no longer with us, his discoveries and academic legacy will always be with mankind.

Written by | Wang Shanqin

On March 15, 2022, local time in Chicago, outstanding physicist, astrophysicist and geophysicist Eugene Newman Parker passed away at the age of 94.

Parker had become a young academic authority in his 20s, and at the age of 30 he became famous for his decisive contribution to the theory of solar wind. Since then, he has continued to work in many fields such as solar physics, plasma physics, and space physics for more than half a century, and the series of important results he obtained have profoundly changed the face of these fields.

This article introduces Parker's legendary, hardworking and wise life.

Young people obsessed with physics

Parker was born on June 10, 1927 in Houghton, Michigan. In an interview later in life, he said that when he was a child, he was very interested in the laws of how things work[1]. When he was in high school, Parker was obsessed with physics. After graduating from high school, Parker entered Michigan State University to study physics.

Figure 1: Parker in his youth. Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WH_TC9VzMUA&t=37s

In 1948, Parker graduated from the University of California with a bachelor's degree at the age of 21, and then went to the California Institute of Technology to pursue a doctorate in the field of interstellar dust and gas structure. Three years later, Parker received his doctorate.

During his undergraduate and doctoral studies, Parker laid a very solid foundation in electromagnetism and fluid mechanics, which provided him with the most adept tools for his subsequent extensive research in many fields.

Parker's research areas can be divided into two categories: the first is the properties of the magnetic fields of the Earth, the Sun, the solar system, and the galaxy; the second is the properties of plasma. Plasma is a mixture of positive ions and electrons that are decomposed into high-temperature gas. The sun is a mass of plasma bound by gravity. Flowing plasma is naturally accompanied by a magnetic field, so these two categories intersect.

Figure: A false color image synthesized from ultraviolet data obtained by the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO). This is very similar to the red and yellow sun we see intuitively in the visible light band. 丨Source: NASA/SDO (AIA) (Public Domain)

In 1951, the 24-year-old Parker worked as a lecturer and assistant professor at the University of Utah for four years. Starting in 1952, Parker demonstrated his academic talent and creativity to the world and achieved important results in many fields.

According to NASA's Astrophysical Database System (ADS), Parker published 20 papers as the first author from 1952 to 1957, including 6 in the Astrophysical Journal (ApJ), 2 in the Astronomical Journal (AJ), 7 in the Physical Review (PR), 2 in the Journal of Geophysical Research (JGR), 1 in Nature, 1 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), and 1 in the Journal of Applied Physics. Only one of the 20 first-author papers had a co-author, and the others were single-author papers.

These papers span physics, astrophysics and geophysics, and study the dynamic properties and gravitational instability of interstellar gas and dust, turbulence and acoustics in the solar ionized zone, turbulent properties of general fluids, acoustic radiation of compressed fluids, instability of thermal fields, the formation mechanism of solar flares, magnetohydrodynamic waves and cosmic ray acceleration, magnetohydrodynamic engine theory, solar magnetohydrodynamic engine theory, geomagnetic storms and many other topics.

Figure 2: X-ray image of a solar flare at a wavelength of 13.1 nanometers. When a solar flare erupts, a local area of ​​the sun will suddenly become brighter. Source: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (Public Domain)

At this time, Parker, who was only 30 years old, was already a formidable young man and a young academic leader. Because of his continuous, stable and high-quality academic achievements, Parker successfully switched to the University of Chicago in 1955.

You may wonder why the above only counts papers up to 1957? This is because he will usher in a legend in his academic career in 1958.

Solar corona, comet tail and "solar particle radiation"

Since 1957, Parker has been paying close attention to topics related to the temperature of the solar corona. The solar corona is a layer of hot, thin gas covering the outside of the sun. It can be easily observed during a solar eclipse. Its shape is like a hat, so foreign astronomers named it "corona", which means "crown" in Latin. In Chinese, it is translated as "corona". When observing the solar corona, astronomers previously confirmed the presence of highly ionized iron ions, and calculated that the temperature of the solar corona is over 1 million degrees Celsius.

Figure 3: This image was taken in France during the total solar eclipse in 1999. The light grey part is the solar corona. The actual solar corona extends much further and cannot be seen in the image. Source: Luc Viatour

In a paper published in 1954, British mathematician and geophysicist Sydney Chapman (1888-1970) calculated the properties of the high-temperature corona and found that the thermal conductivity of the corona is very good and the heat flow will diffuse into space, exceeding the orbit of the earth.

Figure 4: Chapman | Source: Public Domain

Parker certainly took note of Chapman's important paper, but he also took note of the study of comet tails and the related hypothesis that the sun might be constantly emitting charged particles.

These two topics have actually been entangled before.

As early as 1859, British amateur astronomers Richard C. Carrington (1826-1875) and Richard Hodgson (1804-1872) independently observed a sudden and dramatic increase in the brightness of a local part of the sun - a solar flare. In the following days, a violent geomagnetic storm occurred on Earth. Carrington speculated that there was a relationship between solar flares and geomagnetic storms. Irish physicist George Francis FitzGerald (1851-1901) proposed that matter on the surface of the sun was accelerated and reached the earth a few days later, triggering a geomagnetic storm. [2]

Figure 5: Fitzgerald | Source: Public Domain

The study of comet tails gave astronomers another idea. Astronomers found that the "gas tail" of a comet always "hides" from the sun. In 1910, British astronomer Arthur Eddington (1882-1944) proposed in a footnote of a paper on comet research that a large group of ions from the sun would affect comets. He had proposed a similar idea before, but at that time he guessed that it was negatively charged electrons.

Figure 6: Comet tail. Gas tail is gas tail, Dust tail is dust tail. 丨Source: NASA Ames Research Center/K. Jobse, P. Jenniskens (Public Domain)

Figure 7: Eddington | Source: Public Domain

After a detailed study of the Northern Lights, Norwegian astronomer Kristian Birkeland (1867-1917) concluded that the Earth was continuously bombarded by charged particles from the Sun, and in 1916 he first proposed that the particles ejected by the Sun include both negatively charged electrons and positively charged ions.

Figure 8: Bookland | Source: Public Domain

Figure 9: The Southern Lights captured by NASA's satellite "Magnetopause-Aurora Global Exploration Imager" (IMAGE) | Source: NASA (Public Domain)

In 1951, 1952 and 1957, German astronomer Ludwig Biermann (1907-1986) studied the properties of comet tails in three papers and proposed that charged particles emitted by the sun affect the direction of comet tails. He called these particles "solar corpuscular radiation" and pointed out that their speed is about 500 to 1500 kilometers per second.

Figure 10: Biermann | Source:
http://phys-astro.sonoma.edu/brucemedalists/ludwig-biermann

Parker believed that the "heat flow diffused into space" mentioned by Chapman and the "solar particle radiation" that Biermann guessed would affect the direction of the comet's tail were the same thing, and they both came from the hot solar corona.

After rigorous mathematical deduction, Parker proved that because the corona is a good conductor of heat, its outer layer can still reach several million degrees Celsius, so the particles in it have a very high average kinetic energy; while the particles in the outer corona are subject to weaker gravity.

These two factors will enable the particles in the outer corona to overcome the gravitational pull of the Sun and escape from the corona at speeds exceeding the speed of sound, forming high-speed "solar particle radiation."

Hit and Reversal

Parker's paper was received by the ApJ editorial office on January 2, 1958. Following standard procedure, the editor sent it to a reviewer.

The reviewer rejected Parker’s paper. The reviewer said, “Well, I suggest that Parker go to the library and read some related subjects before trying to write a paper, because this paper is complete nonsense.”[3] Other than this comment, the reviewer did not bother to comment on the details of the paper.

It is not very harmful, but extremely insulting.

What's even more tragic is that the second reviewer found by the editorial department also rejected the manuscript.

After Parker's paper was rejected by two reviewers, the then editor-in-chief of ApJ, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (1910-1995), decided to review the paper himself. Chandrasekhar was a versatile master of astrophysics, and during his tenure as editor-in-chief, he could review papers in all fields submitted to ApJ.

Figure 11: Chandrasekhar | Source: Public Domain

After reading Parker's paper, Chandrasekhar also disagreed with the views in Parker's paper. However, he could not find any errors in the mathematical derivation in the paper. Therefore, he agreed to publish the paper.

Why did Chandrasekhar, who was so busy, take the initiative to review the manuscript that was rejected by two reviewers? Because, as mentioned earlier, Parker was already a young academic authority at that time. Chandrasekhar believed that such an outstanding young scholar was less likely to talk nonsense.

At first, Parker used the term "solar particle radiation". In later papers, he changed the name to "solar wind".

In January 1959, the Soviet Union's Luna 1 spacecraft directly detected the solar wind for the first time and measured its intensity. After that, the Luna 2, Luna 3 and Venus 1 spacecraft verified this result. In 1962, NASA's Mariner 2 spacecraft also detected a stable particle flow when it flew over Venus, further confirming Parker's "solar wind" theory.

Figure 12: An artistic rendering of the solar wind hitting Mars and stripping away its upper atmosphere. Source: NASA/GSFC

Although Parker was not the first scholar to speculate on the existence of solar wind, he was the first scholar to rigorously prove that solar wind can be formed. These detection results confirmed the conclusions that Parker had drawn based on solid calculations. Parker's reputation was greatly enhanced.

Figure 13: The equipment of the Solar Wind Composition (SWC) experiment inserted on the moon to collect solar wind and determine its composition. The person standing is Apollo 11 astronaut Edwin E. Aldrin (1930-), and the person taking the photo is Neil Alden Armstrong (1930-2012), the first person to land on the moon. 丨 Source: NASA / Neil A. Armstrong (Public Domain)

Later observations and theoretical studies have proved that the solar wind is indeed the fundamental reason for the direction of comet gas tails, geomagnetic storms and auroras.

Old but still strong, never change your heart

After becoming famous for his research on the solar wind, Parker did not relax. Instead, he worked diligently like a young scholar just starting out in the following half century, making outstanding contributions to various phenomena in solar physics, magnetic fields of celestial systems of various scales, solar-Earth magnetic field interactions, and fluid mechanics and plasma physics itself.

Figure 14: Parker in 1977 | Source:
https://news.uchicago.edu/story/eugene-parker-legendary-figure-solar-science-and-namesake-parker-solar-probe-1927-2022

In 1995, Parker retired at the age of 68. After retirement, Parker remained active in related fields and continued to write books. Until 2012, when he was 85 years old, Parker published a research paper in Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion (PPCF), which was exactly 60 years away from the year he published his first paper (1952).

Parker's 60 years of hard work have deepened people's understanding of solar physics, geophysics, fluid dynamics, plasma physics and other fields, and reshaped the face of many of these fields. His work is based on a solid and sophisticated mathematical foundation and guided by a profound physical intuition. Parker's colleague, Robert Rosner, a professor of astronomy and astrophysics at the University of Chicago, praised Parker as an "ideal physicist" because he is "brilliant and accomplished, personable, articulate, but also humble" [4], and he deeply admires his amazing physical intuition and mathematical analysis ability.

Figure 15: Elderly Parker writing a system of equations. 丨Source:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WH_TC9VzMUA&t=37s

Parker's 60 years of hard work have brought a lot of results to the academic community. According to the ADS index, Parker has published more than 200 first-author research papers in international top journals in various fields of his research, most of which are single-author papers[5]. In addition, Parker has written many invited reviews and advanced popular science, and published many textbooks. These works not only testify to Parker's talent, but also to his diligence.

Figure 16: Colleagues celebrate Parker’s 90th birthday | Source: Jean Lachat

Because of Parker's many outstanding contributions, people named some phenomena, models and equations after him, such as [4]: ​​Parker instability describing the instability of magnetic buoyancy within galaxies, Parker equation describing particles passing through plasma, Sweet-Parker model describing the magnetic field of plasma, Parker spiral describing the interplanetary magnetic field, Parker limit describing the limit of magnetic monopole flow, etc.

Figure 17: Schematic diagram of the Parker spiral arm. Source: Miserlou (Public Domain)

Uncrowned King

Parker's many important achievements have also earned him numerous awards and honors.

In 1967, Parker was elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences. In 1969, Parker received the Henry Norris Russell Lectureship and the Arctowski Medal for his research on solar physics and the relationship between the Sun and the Earth.

In 1978, the American Astronomical Society awarded the first Hale Prize to honor scholars who have made outstanding contributions to solar physics. Parker became the first winner of the Hale Prize. Hale's (George Ellery Hale, 1868-1938) astronomical achievements focused on solar physics, but his greatest contribution to astronomy was raising funds to build two large telescopes that dominated the world for decades.

Figure 18: Haier | Source: Public Domain

In 1979, Parker received the Chapman Medal from the Royal Astronomical Society of the United Kingdom. This Chapman is the Chapman mentioned above who proved that the high-temperature corona has good thermal conductivity.

In 1989, Parker received the National Medal of Science. In 1990, Parker received the William Bowie Medal, the highest award in the U.S. Earth sciences. In 1992, Parker received the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society. In 1997, Parker received the Bruce Medal. In 2003, Parker received the James Clerk Maxwell Prize, which is awarded to scholars who have made outstanding contributions to plasma physics.

In 2018, Parker received the Medal for Exceptional Achievement in Research from the American Physical Society for his "fundamental contributions to space physics, plasma physics, and astrophysics over the past 60 years."[6]

In 2020, Parker won the last award of his life: the Crafoord Prize in Astronomy, which can be regarded as a lifetime achievement award.

The Crafoord Prize was established in 1980 by a foundation established by Swedish industrialist and philanthropist Holger Crafoord (1908-1982) and his wife, and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences is responsible for selecting the winners. The Crafoord Prize began to be awarded in 1982.

In a sense, this award is harder to win than the Nobel Prize: before 2000, it was only given to one of the fields of astronomy and mathematics, biological sciences, and earth sciences each year. Since then, due to the increase in rewards for research in the field of arthritis, it often takes four years for a field to get the award. Before 2008, you can only choose between astronomy and mathematics, and astronomers must take turns with mathematicians every six years. After 2008, astronomers and mathematicians can win the award at the same time.

In the 37 years since 1985, only 12 astronomers have won the Crawford Prize in Astronomy[7]. Three of them later won the Nobel Prize in Physics[8], and the remaining nine are also leading scholars in related fields. He was awarded this prize for his "pioneering and fundamental research on magnetic fields at the solar wind, stellar and galactic scales"[9].

Although Parker did not win the Nobel Prize, numerous awards, especially the Crafford Prize in Astronomy, have confirmed his lofty status as the "uncrowned king".

Parker meets "Parker"

In 2017, with Parker's willing consent, NASA changed the name of the "Solar Probe Plus" to "The Parker Solar Probe", which is about to be launched into space. We will refer to it as "Parker" below and use quotation marks to distinguish it from Parker as a person.

The $1.5 billion Parker mission is to directly detect the energy flow that heats the corona and accelerates solar wind particles, determine the properties of the magnetic field in the region where the solar wind is generated, and determine how those high-energy particles are accelerated and transported.

When the staff brought Parker into the clean room where "Parker" was stored and let the two "meet", people witnessed the exciting moment when Parker met "Parker".

The rocket that launched Parker was the Delta IV Heavy rocket of the United Launch Alliance (ULA), which has the second-largest carrying capacity in the world and costs about $400 million per launch. Before the launch, Parker was ceremoniously invited to the front of the rocket and took a photo with the rocket accompanied by Thomas Zurbuchen, then deputy administrator of NASA, and Tory Bruno, CEO of ULA.

Figure 19: Before the launch of Parker, Parker (center) took a photo with Thomas Zurbuchen (left) and Tory Bruno (right) in front of the rocket launch pad. 丨 Source: Bill Ingalls/NASA

On August 12, 2018, Parker was launched into space, and Parker himself was present to witness the event. According to the plan, Parker will orbit the sun 26 times, and during 7 of these times, it will change its orbit with the help of Venus' gravity when approaching Venus, gradually approaching the sun and passing directly through the solar corona, with the closest approach to the sun's surface being only about 6 million kilometers.

Figure 20: At 3:31 a.m. on August 12, 2018, the Delta IV Heavy rocket launched Parker at Cape Canaveral. Source: Bill Ingalls/NASA

Figure 21: At 3:31 a.m. on August 12, 2018, Parker watched the launch of the "Parker" at the launch site. 丨 Source: Bill Ingalls/NASA

In April 2021, Parker passed through the solar corona for the first time, becoming the first probe in human history to "touch" the sun.

Figure 22: Artistic conception of Parker approaching the sun | Source: Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory

Now, Parker, who spent his life trying to crack the secrets of the sun, has passed away, but Parker continues to explore these secrets. In a few years, Parker will complete his mission, but Parker and Parker's discoveries and academic legacy will always accompany mankind.

As Nicola Fox, director of the heliophysics group at NASA Headquarters, said when Parker was still alive: "Even though Dr. Parker is no longer with us, his discoveries and his legacy will live on forever."[10]

Figure 23: Parker | Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WH_TC9VzMUA&t=37s

Notes

[1] The original text is: As a child, I enjoyed very much learning how things work.

[2] One of Fitzgerald’s more famous works is the “Fitzgerald contraction formula” in relativity.

[3] The original text is: "Well I would suggest that Parker go to the library and read up on the subject before he tries to write a paper about it, because this is utter nonsense."

[4]https://news.uchicago.edu/story/eugene-parker-legendary-figure-solar-science-and-namesake-parker-solar-probe-1927-2022

[5] Among them, 117, 2, 12, 6 and 9 articles were published in astronomy journals such as ApJ, AJ, Solar Physics, Space Science Reviews and Astrophysics and Space Science respectively; 23 and 20 articles were published in geophysics journals such as JGR and Geophysical and Astrophysical Fluid Dynamics respectively; 16, 6, 3 and 1 article were published in physics journals such as PR series and Physics of Fluids, PPCF and Physics of Plasmas respectively; and 1 article each was published in comprehensive journals such as PNAS and Nature (the other 3 articles published in Nature were review articles).

[6] The original text is: For fundamental contributions to space physics, plasma physics, solar physics and astrophysics for over 60 years.

[7] The winners of the Crafoord Medal in Astronomy are Lyman Spitzer, Allan Sandage, Fred Hoyle, Edwin Ernest Salpeter, James E. Gunn, James Peebles, Martin Rees, Rashid Alievich Sunyaev, Reinhard Genzel, Andrea M. Ghez, Roy Kerr, Roger Blandford and Parker.

[8] Peebles won the 2019 Nobel Prize in Physics; Genzel and Kies won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Physics.

[9] The original text is: “for pioneering and fundamental studies of the solar wind and magnetic fields from stellar to galactic scales.”

[10] The original text is: "Even though Dr. Parker is no longer with us, his discoveries and legacy will live forever."

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