A trajetória científica do físico Padre Jesuíta Francisco Xavier Roser (1933-1967): dos raios cósmicos ao Instituto de Física da Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro

Abstract

The professional scientific life of the Jesuit Priest Francisco Xavier Roser was notable for his work as a scientist in the field of radioactivity, professor of scientific disciplines, member of the delegation of the international scientific committee at the United Nations to investigate the effects of ionizing radiation on human health and scientific manager. In this thesis we present his scientific trajectory since his training in the field of physics (1933) in Austria until his death (1967), when he held the position of director of the Institute of Physics at Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro. We approach your investigations in the fields of cosmic rays, particle detection, nuclear induction, and natural and artificial radioactivity. The methodology used in this study comprised the analysis of documents deposited both in the priest’s archives at the Jesuit Curia in Rio de Janeiro (letters, iconographies, and internal documents) and at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro Memory Centre (yearbooks, iconographies, reports, and documents), their scientific production. We also analysed the minutes and reports of institutions such as the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development, the Brazilian Centre for Research in Physics, the National Nuclear Energy Commission, and the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation. Through this documentation, we show some aspects of the scientific practice experienced by a Brazilian scientist in the period known in the literature as the stabilization of professional physics in Brazil, from the technical part, through the collaboration network to the process of obtaining resources through dialogue. with national and international funding agencies; In this way, Father Roser’s scientific itinerary reveals to us: the dynamics and the political, scientific and organizational context of the institutions he passed through in his trajectory; aspects of scientific practice within a religious institution; the details of setting up scientific research lines; details on granting resources to research programs and grants for study or work abroad; the participation of the Brazilian scientific delegation at United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation and the main contributions to studies on ionizing radiation and radioactive environmental contamination; his work in the laboratories of Nobel laureates; finally, the context of the creation of the Institute of Physics at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro.