The connection between spin and statistics, pp. 716-22 in Physical Review Vol. 58, No. 8, October 15, 1940. THE SPIN-STATISTICS THEOREM

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First editions, complete journal issue in original printed wrappers, of Pauli's paper which established the connection between the spin of particles and the statistics they obey: particles of integer spin are bosons, i.e., they must obey Bose-Einstein statistics, and those of half-integer spin are fermions, i.e., they must obey Fermi-Dirac statistics. This was an extension and completion of Pauli s Exclusion Principle, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics 1945, which states that no two electrons can occupy the same quantum state. In mathematical terms, the spin-statistics connection means that the quantization of fields with half-integer spin relies on anti-commutation relations, whereas that of fields with integer spin uses commutation relations. Equivalently, the wave function of a system of bosons is symmetric if any pair of bosons is interchanged, but is antisymmetric for interchanged particles in a system of fermions. The spin-statistics theorem, which relates the intrinsic angular momentum of a single particle to the type of quantum statistics obeyed by a system of many such particles, is one of the central theorems in quantum field theory and the physics of elementary particles. It was first formulated in 1939/40 by Wolfgang Pauli and his assistant Markus Fierz . . . the methods Pauli employed proved essential for the renaissance of quantum field theory and the development of renormalization techniques in the late 1940s (Blum, From the necessary to the possible: the genesis of the spin-statistics theorem, The European Physics Journal 39 (2014), pp. 543-574). From Pauli s spin statistics connection arises the exclusion principle for fermions, with its implications for atomic structure, and a non-exclusion principle for bosons many bosons can adopt the same quantum state at once, as happens in a Bose Einstein condensate. Further particle discoveries since 1940 and the subsequent building of the standard model have also served to confirm that nature works with both integer and half-integer spins (Nature Milestones: Spin). Large 8vo, pp. 665-759. Original printed wrappers. N° de ref. del artículo ABE-1610044439864

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