Olival Freire Jr. (

Jequié Jequié is a city in the state of Bahia, Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Br ...

, 1954) is a

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate cau ...

and historian of physics. He is Full Professor of Physics and History of Physics at the

Universidade Federal da Bahia The Federal University of Bahia ( pt, Universidade Federal da Bahia, UFBA) is a public university located mainly in the city of Salvador. It is the largest university in the state of Bahia and one of Brazil's most prestigious educational institu ...

, former president of the ''Brazilian Society for the History of Science'' and president of the Commission for the History of Modern Physics,

International Union of History and Philosophy of Science The International Union of History and Philosophy of Science and Technology is one of the members of the International Science Council (ISC). It was founded in 1955 by merging the ''International Union of History of Science'' (IUHS) and the ''Inter ...

Education and career

Freire Jr. studied electrical engineering for a year and a half at the

(UFBA) before, impressed by the lectures of physicist Benedito Pepe, he switched to physics.Interview with the physicist Olival Freire. Jr. by Wagner Ferreia
, 13 April 2011 (downloaded 26 March 2012) He wrote his master's thesis with Amelia Hambuger on interpretations of quantum physics, in particular the interpretation by

Vladimir Fock Vladimir Aleksandrovich Fock (or Fok; russian: Влади́мир Алекса́ндрович Фок) (December 22, 1898 – December 27, 1974) was a Soviet physicist, who did foundational work on quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamic ...

, and subsequently wrote his Ph.D. thesis with Michel Paty and Shozo Montoyama on

David Bohm David Joseph Bohm (; 20 December 1917 – 27 October 1992) was an American-Brazilian-British scientist who has been described as one of the most significant theoretical physicists of the 20th centuryPeat 1997, pp. 316-317 and who contributed ...

's approach to

quantum mechanics Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory in physics that provides a description of the physical properties of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. It is the foundation of all quantum physics including quantum chemistr ...

. He worked as post-doctoral researcher at the Université Paris VII, at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

, and subsequently at the

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...

. Freire Jr. is Associate Professor and Researcher II UFBA in the History of Science. He is also president of the ''Brazilian Society for the History of Science'' and vice-president of the Commission for the History of Modern Physics,

. His current research covers especially also the history of science in

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

Awards and honors

In 2004, Freire Jr. was awarded a Senior Fellowship from the

Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology The Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology (1992–2006) was a research institute established at MIT, and housed in a renovated building (E56) on campus at 38 Memorial Drive, overlooking the Charles River.Charles H. BallMIT to ...

, MIT, USA. In 2011, he was one of the winners of the Prêmio Jabuti in

exact sciences The exact sciences, sometimes called the exact mathematical sciences, are those sciences "which admit of absolute precision in their results"; especially the mathematical sciences. Examples of the exact sciences are mathematics, optics, astron ...

for his book on ''Quantum theory: historical studies and cultural implications''.

Publications

* Olival Freire Jr.
"A story without an ending: the quantum physics controversy 1950–1970"
''Science & Education'', vol. 12, pp. 573–586, 2003 * Olival Freire Jr.
"Science and Exile: David Bohm, the Hot Times of the Cold War, and His Struggle for a New Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics"
''Historical Studies on the Physical and Biological Sciences'', vol. 36, no. 1, 2005, pp. 31–35 * Olival Freire: ''David Bohm e a controvérsia dos quanta''. Coleção CLE, Volume 27. Campinas :

UNICAMP The State University of Campinas ( pt, Universidade Estadual de Campinas), commonly called Unicamp, is a public research university in the state of São Paulo, Brazil. Unicamp is consistently ranked among the top universities in Brazil and Latin ...

, Centro de Lógica, Epistemologia e História da Ciência, 1999, 244 p. * Olival Freire Jr.
"David Bohm e as controvérsias do mundo dos Quanta"
''Ciência Hoje'', março de 2001, p. 35 * Olival Freire Jr.: ''L'interprétation de la mécanique quantique selon Paul Langevin'', La Pensée, 1993 (''Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics according to Paul Langevin''). * Olival Freire Jr.
''The quantum dissidents: rebuilding the foundations of quantum mechanics (1950-1990)''
Springer, 2014.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Freire, Olival Jr. Living people 20th-century Brazilian physicists Historians of science 20th-century Brazilian historians Year of birth missing (living people) Place of birth missing (living people) Academic staff of the Federal University of Bahia