The Rutherford Memorial Lecture, 1983 - Rutherford and beta decay

Abstract

Rutherford’s concern for the properties of the α-particle did not divert him from the more difficult task of characterizing beta decay. The lecture traces the experimental steps by which some of the main features of this process were established in his laboratories at Montreal, Manchester and Cambridge. It concludes with a brief account of some beta-decay experi­ments that throw light on the mass of the Z 0 boson of the weak interaction.