Cambridge Cluster

Image via WikipediaIt is not everyone who can say that they live round the corner from a Noble Prize Winner but in Cambridge it is nothing unusual.  It was interesting to read the obituary of Professor Sir Brian Pippard who died on my birthday, September 21, aged 88.

Shortly after he was appointed Professor of Physics in 1960, he became the doctoral supervisor of Brian Josephson, but to quote from the obituary in the Daily Telegraph, “he found Josephson’s ideas to be so incomprehensible that, a year later, he asked him to consult with Phil Anderson, a frequent visitor to the Cavendish.  The resulting research led to the discovery of the Josephson Junction, which gained Josephson a Nobel Prize in Physics“.

Not many PhD students receive a Nobel Prize for their work but the prize was not shared with Anderson or Pippard but with two others.   The mysteries of the academic world.  Phil Anderson won another Nobel Prize.

You can read Brian Josephson’s Nobel dated 12 December 1973 and the life of Phil Anderson also makes fascinating reading.  Both are very much alive I hasten to add.