William Henry Bragg

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William Henry Bragg bigraphy, stories - English scientist

William Henry Bragg : biography

2 July 1862 – 12 March 1942

Sir William Henry Bragg OM, KBE, PRS (2 July 1862 – 10 March 1942) was a British physicist, chemist, mathematician and active sportsman who uniquelyThis is still a unique accomplishment, because no other parent-child combination has yet shared a Nobel Prize (in any field). In several cases, a parent has won a Nobel Prize, and then years later, the child has won the Nobel Prize for separate research. An example of this is with Marie Curie and her daughter Irène Joliot-Curie, who are the only mother-daughter pair. Several father-son pairs have won two separate Nobel Prizes. shared a Nobel Prize with his son William Lawrence Bragg – the 1915 Nobel Prize in Physics: "for their services in the analysis of crystal structure by means of X-rays". The mineral Braggite is named after him and his son. He was knighted in 1920.

Biography

Early years

Bragg was born at Westward near Wigton, Cumberland, the son of Robert John Bragg, a merchant marine officer and farmer, and his wife Mary née Wood, a clergyman’s daughter. When Bragg was seven years old, his mother died, and he was raised by his uncle, also named William Bragg, at Market Harborough, Leicestershire. He was educated at the Old Grammar School there, at King William’s College on the Isle of Man, and having won an exhibition [scholarship], at Trinity College, Cambridge. He graduated in 1884 as third wrangler, and in 1885 was awarded a "first" in the mathematical tripos.

University of Adelaide

In 1885, (at the age of 23), Bragg was appointed (Sir Thomas) Elder Professor of Mathematics and Experimental Physics at the University of Adelaide,, University of Adelaide, Pages 3 & 4. Proof of advertisement in the Oxford University Gazette of 16 October 1885, and the Cambridge University Reporter of 13 October 1885. The advertisements read:

THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE
ELDER PROFESSOR OF MATHEMATICS AND EXPERIMENTAL PHYSICS
The Council invite applications for the above Professorship. Salary £800 per annum. The appointment will be for a term of five years, subject to renewal at the discretion of the Council. Salary will date from March 1, 1886, and the Professor will be expected to enter on his duties on that date. An allowance will be made for travelling expenses. Applications with testimonials should reach … not later than December 1, 1885.

Bragg was informed of his appointment by a letter dated 17 December 1885. and started work there early in 1886. Being a skilled mathematician, at that time he had limited knowledge of physics, most of which was in the form of applied mathematics he had learnt at Trinity. Also at that time, there were only about a hundred students doing full courses at Adelaide, of whom less than a handful belonged to the science school, whose deficient teaching facilities Bragg improved by apprenticing himself to a firm of instrument makers. Bragg was an able and popular lecturer; he encouraged the formation of the student union, and the attendance, free of charge, of science teachers at his lectures.

Bragg’s interest in physics developed, particularly in the field of electromagnetism. In 1895 he was visited by Ernest Rutherford, en route from New Zealand to Cambridge; this was the commencement of a lifelong friendship. "The turning-point in Bragg’s career came in 1904 when he gave the presidential address to section A of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science at Dunedin, New Zealand", on "Some Recent Advances in the Theory of the Ionization of Gases". This idea was followed up "in a brilliant series of researches" which, within three years, earned him a fellowship of the Royal Society of London. This paper was also the origin of his first book Studies in Radioactivity (1912). Soon after the delivery of his 1904 address, some radium bromide was made available to Bragg for experimentation. In December 1904 his paper "On the Absorption of a Rays and on the Classification of the a Rays from Radium" appeared in the Philosophical Magazine, and in the same issue a paper "On the Ionization Curves of Radium", written in collaboration with his student Richard Kleeman, also appeared.