JonoThora: Psionics expansion (01a + 01b): content authored / LaTeX-restored per local submodule; lint-clean.

2026-05-11T20:50:00Z

Psionics expansion (01a + 01b): content authored / LaTeX-restored per local submodule; lint-clean.

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{{Audience_Sidebar
| difficulty = Intermediate
| reading_time = 4 minutes
| prerequisites = [[Psionics_Primer]]; superconductivity basics.
| if_too_advanced_see = [[Cooper_Pair_Mass_Anomaly]]
| if_you_want_the_math_see = [[Cooper_Pair_Mass_Anomaly]]
}}

{{Person_Vital_Stats
| name = James E. Tate
| birth = (not publicly disclosed)
| death = (living)
| nationality = American
| field = Experimental low-temperature physics
| affiliation = Stanford University (during the Cooper-pair-mass work); subsequently other institutions
| key_works = Tate-Cabrera-Felch-Anderson 1989 ''Physical Review B''; Tate 1990 ''Physical Review Letters''
| era = Late 20th century
}}

== Summary ==

'''James E. Tate''' is an American experimental physicist who, while at Stanford in the late 1980s, conducted high-precision measurements of the Cooper-pair effective mass in rotating superconducting niobium rings. The results (Tate et al. 1989, 1990) showed an apparent anomaly: the measured Cooper-pair mass exceeded the standard BCS prediction by approximately 80 parts per million — a discrepancy never satisfactorily resolved and frequently cited in the gravitomagnetic-superconductor literature.

== Life ==

Tate completed his physics PhD at Stanford in the late 1980s, working with Blas Cabrera (the magnetic-monopole detector physicist) on precision low-temperature measurements. After Stanford he moved to other research positions; his subsequent publication record is sparse in the public archive.

== Key Contributions ==

=== Cooper-pair mass measurement ===

The Tate-Cabrera-Felch-Anderson 1989 ''Physical Review B'' 39: 11600 paper and follow-up Tate 1990 ''Physical Review Letters'' 65: 1418 reported precision measurements of the rotational magnetic moment of superconducting niobium rings. The measurement determines the Cooper-pair effective mass through the London moment relation.

The result: m*/me = 1.000084(21) — approximately 84 parts per million ''higher'' than the BCS-theoretical prediction of m* = 2me (or, more carefully, the BCS-corrected prediction of m* = 1.999963 me).

The discrepancy is ~ 4σ from zero. Subsequent theoretical work (Liu 1998, others) has proposed various conventional explanations (lattice contributions, finite-size effects) but the discrepancy has not been definitively resolved.

The anomaly has been adopted by the gravitomagnetic-superconductor research programme as candidate evidence for the Li-Torr / Tajmar / Modanese predictions.

== Reception ==

The Tate measurements are mainstream-published, precision-physics work. The anomaly is real (in the sense of being statistically significant) but its interpretation is contested. Mainstream condensed-matter physics treats the discrepancy as a precision-measurement puzzle awaiting better theoretical understanding; alternative-physics communities treat it as suggestive evidence for non-standard gravitational effects.

== Bibliography ==

* Tate, J., Cabrera, B., Felch, S. B., Anderson, J. T. (1989). "Precise determination of the Cooper-pair mass." ''Physical Review B'' 39: 11600.
* Tate, J. (1990). "Determination of the Cooper-pair mass in niobium." ''Physical Review Letters'' 65: 1418.

== See Also ==

* [[Ning_Li]]
* [[Martin_Tajmar]]
* [[Cooper_Pair_Mass_Anomaly]]
* [[Gravitomagnetic_London_Moment]]

== External Links ==

* Stanford Physics archive.

== References ==

* As above.

[[Category:Psionics]]
[[Category:Biographies]]
[[Category:Gravitomagnetism]]

James E Tate - Revision history

JonoThora: Psionics expansion (01a + 01b): content authored / LaTeX-restored per local submodule; lint-clean.