text: Radiation pressure is the force that electromagnetic radiation exerts on matter.  In 1873 Maxwell published his treatise on electromagnetism in which he predicted radiation pressure.  The force was experimentally demonstrated for the first time by Lebedev and reported at a conference in Paris in 1900, and later published in more detail in 1901.   Following Lebedev's measurements Nichols and Hull also demonstrated the force of radiation pressure in 1901, with a refined measurement reported in 1903.
  In 1933, Otto Frisch deflected an atomic beam of sodium atoms with light.  
  This was the first realization of radiation pressure acting on a resonant absorber.