Martinus Justinus Godefriedus "Tini" Veltman
(Dutch pronunciation: [mɑrˈtinʏʃʏsˈtinʏs
xoːdəˈfridʏs ˈtini ˈvɛltmɑn]; born
27 June 1931) is a Dutch theoretical physicist.
He shared the 1999 Nobel Prize in physics
with his former student Gerardus 't Hooft
for their work on particle theory.
== Biography ==
Martinus Justinus Godefriedus Veltman was
born in Waalwijk, Netherlands on 27 June 1931.
His father was the head of the local primary
school. Three of his father's siblings were
primary school teachers. His mother's father
was a contractor and also ran a café. He
was the fourth child in a family with six
children. He started studying mathematics
and physics at Utrecht University in 1948.As
a youth he had a great interest in radio electronics,
which was a difficult hobby to work on because
the occupying German army had confiscated
most of the available radio equipment.In 1955,
he became an assistant to Prof. Michels of
the Van Der Waals laboratory in Amsterdam.
Michels was an experimental physicist, working
in high pressure physics. His primary task
was the upkeep of a large library collection
and occasional lecture preparations for Michels.
His research career advanced when he moved
to Utrecht to work under Leon Van Hove in
1955. He received his MSc degree in 1956,
after which he was drafted into military service
for two years, returning in February 1959.
Van Hove then hired him as a doctoral researcher,
even though he was now 27 years old. He obtained
his PhD degree in theoretical physics in 1963
and became professor at Utrecht University
in 1966.In 1960, Van Hove became director
of the theory division at CERN in Geneva,
Switzerland, the European High Energy laboratory.
Veltman followed him there in 1961. Meanwhile,
in 1960, he married his wife Anneke, who gave
birth to their daughter Hélène in the Netherlands,
before moving to Geneva to live with Martinus.
Hélène followed in her father's footsteps
and in due time completed her particle physics
thesis with Mary Gaillard at Berkeley, though
she now works in the financial industry in
London.In 1963/64, during an extended stay
at SLAC he designed the computer program Schoonschip
for symbolic manipulation of mathematical
equations, which is now considered the very
first computer algebra system.
Veltman was closely involved in the 1963 CERN
neutrino experiment, analyzing images as they
were generated by the detectors. When no spectacular
events came out, enthusiasm waned, and after
a while Veltman and Bernardini were the only
ones analyzing the images. As a result, Veltman
became the spokesman for the group at the
Brookhaven Conference in 1963.In 1971, Gerardus
't Hooft, who was completing his PhD under
the supervision of Veltman, renormalized Yang–Mills
theory. They showed that if the symmetries
of Yang–Mills theory were to be realized
in the spontaneously broken mode, referred
to as the Higgs mechanism, then Yang–Mills
theory can be renormalized. Renormalization
of Yang–Mills theory is a major achievement
of twentieth century physics.
In 1980, Veltman became member of the Royal
Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.
In 1981, Veltman left Utrecht University for
the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, from
where he retired in 1996.
Eventually, he shared the Nobel Prize for
Physics in 1999 with 't Hooft, "for elucidating
the quantum structure of electroweak interactions
in physics". Veltman and 't Hooft joined in
the celebrations at Utrecht University when
the prize was awarded.
Veltman holds a position of Emeritus Professor
at the University of Michigan. Asteroid 9492
Veltman is named in his honor.
In 2003, Veltman published a book about particle
physics for a broad audience, entitled Facts
and Mysteries in Elementary Particle Physics.
== Bibliography ==
Veltman, M. "Perturbation Theory of Massive
Yang-Mills Fields", Utrecht Rijksuniversiteit
(Netherlands). Instituut voor Theoretische
Fysica. Paris Univ., Orsay (France). Laboratoire
de Physique Théorique et Hautes Energies,
(Aug. 1968).
Veltman, M. & J. Yellin. "Some Comments on
the Decays of eta (550)", Brookhaven National
Laboratory, United States Department of Energy
(through predecessor agency the Atomic Energy
Commission), July 1966.
Veltman, M. Facts and Mysteries in Elementary
Particle Physics, World Scientific Publishing,
2003. ISBN 981-238-149-X
