Frederik Belinfante

{{Short description|Dutch physicist (1913–1991)}}

{{Infobox scientist

| name = Frederik Jozef Belinfante

| image =

| image_size =

| caption =

| birth_date = {{birth date|1913|01|06|df=y}}

| birth_place = The Hague

| death_date = {{death date and age|1991|06|05|1913|01|06|df=y}}

| death_place = Gresham, Oregon

| nationality = Dutch

| fields = Physics

| workplaces = University of British Columbia
Purdue University

| alma_mater = Leiden University

| doctoral_advisor =

| doctoral_students = Deng Jiaxian

| known_for = Belinfante–Rosenfeld stress–energy tensor

| awards =

}}

Frederik Jozef Belinfante (6 January 1913 – 5 June 1991){{Cite web|url = http://people.math.gatech.edu/~belinfan/research/vitae/|title = Brief Vita for Johan G. F. Belinfante|date = |accessdate = 2015-11-28|website = |last = Belinfante|first = Johan}}{{Cite book|title = No Time to be Brief: A Scientific Biography of Wolfgang Pauli|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=c-UJWhBaZBgC|publisher = Oxford University Press|date = 2002-01-01|isbn = 9780198564799|language = en|first = Charles Paul|last = Enz}} was a Dutch physicist and a professor at Purdue University.{{cite web|title=Leon Rosenfeld letter to F.J. Belinfante 22-June-1972|url=http://ucispace.lib.uci.edu/handle/10575/1137|website=UCI Libraries|publisher=University of California, Irvine|accessdate=22 November 2015}} He was a proponent of the hidden variable interpretation of quantum mechanics.{{cite book|last1=Jammer|first1=Max|title=Einstein and religion: physics and theology|date=2011|publisher=Princeton University Press|location=Princeton, New Jersey|isbn=978-0-691-10297-9|page=231|edition=Fifth|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=58HQXMp1ESwC&dq=fj+belinfante+dutch&pg=PA231|accessdate=22 November 2015}} Belinfante was born in the Hague and was a student of H. A. Kramers at Leiden University. His Ph.D. thesis, published in 1939, is called 'Theory of Heavy Quanta'.{{Cite book|title = Theory of Heavy Quanta: Proefschrift|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=uO7moQEACAAJ|publisher = Springer Netherlands|date = 1939-01-01|isbn = 9789401700108|language = en|first = F. J.|last = Belinfante}} Belinfante emigrated to Vancouver in 1946 and became an associate professor at the University of British Columbia. Two years later, in 1948, he moved to the United States and became a professor at Purdue. There, he studied quantum theory and cosmology.

While writing his Ph.D. thesis, Belinfante co-authored a paper with Wolfgang Pauli called 'On the statistical behaviour of known and unknown elementary particles'{{Cite journal|title = On the statistical behaviour of known and unknown elementary particles|journal = Physica|date = 1940-03-01|pages = 177–192|volume = 7|issue = 3|doi = 10.1016/S0031-8914(40)90104-5|first1 = W.|last1 = Pauli|first2 = F. J.|last2 = Belinfante|bibcode = 1940Phy.....7..177P }} Along with Léon Rosenfeld, Belinfante derived the Belinfante–Rosenfeld stress–energy tensor.

Belinfante's works include Measurement and Time Reversal in Objective Quantum Theory (1975) and Survey of Hidden Variable Theories (1973), both part of the Monographs in Natural Philosophy series.{{cite web|title=Books by F. J. Belinfante|url=https://www.amazon.com/F.-J.-Belinfante/e/B001KD3HWO|website=Amazon|publisher=Amazon|accessdate=22 November 2015}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.genealogy.math.ndsu.nodak.edu/id.php?id=110571|title=Mathematics Genealogy Project}}