Pomeranchuk and the 1st paper on mirror matter theory

The first paper on mirror matter theory was published in Sov. J. Nucl. Phys in June, 1966 by I. Yu Kobzarev, L. B. Okun, and I. Ya Pomeranchuk. Both Kobzarev and Okun are students of Pomeranchuk.

Isaak Yakovlevich Pomeranchuk (5/20/1913-12/14/1966) was a highly achieved Soviet physicist but unfortunately was diagnosed with cancer in the fall of 1965 and died young at age 53 the following year. So this first mirror matter theory paper, arguably his most important paper, was also one of his last ones.

I was looking for a portrait of Pomeranchuk and found one in “In memorium Isaak Yakovlevich Pomeranchuk (A tribute on the 80th anniversary of his birth)” by A. I. Akhiezer written in 1994. It is not a surprise that there was no single word on his mirror matter paper even though many of his other scientific contributions were discussed in the memorial article. 1994 was still too early for recognition of the mirror matter ideas.

However, it was shocking to me that this paper was not mentioned either in “The Life and Legacy of Pomeranchuk” by L. B. Okun as the introductory talk given at the conference “I. Ya. Pomeranchuk and physics at the turn of centuries” in 2003. Neither is it mentioned under his Wikipedia page.  Fortunately, Okun eventually talked and shared his memory about this important paper in a historic note on early development of mirror matter theory published in 2007.

Pomeranchuk’s life reminds me of Walter Mampe’s. Pomeranchuk was a theorist but Mampe was an experimentalist. Mampe was a pioneer on neutron lifetime measurements (see this review paper about his work). He also died of cancer at age 53 right after his most important work. Let’s remember these great scientists and their crucial contributions to our understanding of the world.