ABSTRACT
The formulation of the laws of motion by Galileo and Newton paved the way for a quantitative study of the motions of particles endowed with an inertial property called mass. Particles of integral spin are described by wave functions which are symmetric under the interchange of any two particles, and those of half-odd integral spin are described by wave functions which are antisymmetric under the interchange of any two particles. In order to induce nuclear transmutations artificially, and enlarge on what was learned about nuclear transformations from natural radioactivity, it was necessary to accelerate particles to energies in the millions of electron volts range. The frequency of occurrence of new particles in cosmic rays was such that it was not possible to obtain an accurate measure of their properties, such as mass, lifetime and parity. A realistic proposal to explore high energy processes by colliding one beam of particles against another was put forward for the first time in 1956.
