Light is a Messenger : The Life and Science of William Lawrence Bragg /
Graeme K. Hunter.
- Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2004.
- xxi, 301 p. : ill. ; 25 cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
0. Introduction; 1. A shy and reserved person: Adelaide, 1886-1908; 2. Concatenation of fortunate circumstances: Cambridge, 1909-1914; 3. Our show is going famously: World War One, 1914-1919; 4. A system of simple and elegant architecture: Manchester, 1919-1930; 5. Plus-plus chemistry: Manchester, 1931-1937; 6. Supreme position in British physics: The National Physics Laboratory and Cambridge, 1937-1939; 7. He will have to be Sir Lawrence: World War Two, 1939-1945; 8. A message in code which we cannot yet decipher: Cambridge, 1945-53; 9. The art of popular lecturing on scientific subjects: The Royal Institution, 1954-1966; 10. A very difficult affair indeed: Retirement, 1966-1971; 11. Epilogue
Light is a Messenger is the first biography of William Lawrence Bragg, who was only 25 when he won the 1915 Nobel Prize in Physics - the youngest person ever to win a Nobel Prize. It describes how Bragg discovered the use of X-rays to determine the arrangement of atoms in crystals and his pivotal role in developing this technique to the point that structures of the most complex molecules known to Man - the proteins and nucleic acids - could be solved. Although Bragg's Nobel Prize was for physics, his research profoundly affected chemistry and the new field of molecular biology, of which he became a founding figure. This book explains how these revolutionary scientific events occurred while Bragg struggled to emerge from the shadow of his father, Sir William Bragg, and amidst a career-long rivalry with the brilliant American chemist, Linus Pauling.