bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Amyloid of the prion domain of Sup35p has an in-register parallel β-sheet structure
Authors: Shewmaker Frank , Wickner Reed B. , Tycko Robert
Published: December 2006

The [
PSI
+
] prion of
Saccharomyces cerevisiae
is a self-propagating amyloid form of Sup35p, a subunit of the translation termination factor. Using solid-state NMR we have examined the structure of amyloid fibrils formed
in vitro
from purified recombinant Sup35
1–253
, consisting of the glutamine- and asparagine-rich N-terminal 123-residue prion domain (N) and the adjacent 130-residue highly charged M domain. Measurements of magnetic dipole–dipole couplings among
13
C nuclei in a series of Sup35NM fibril samples,
13
C-labeled at backbone carbonyl sites of Tyr, Leu, or Phe residues or at side-chain methyl sites of Ala residues, indicate intermolecular
13
C–
13
C distances of ≈0.5 nm for nearly all sites in the N domain. Certain sites in the M domain also exhibit intermolecular distances of ≈0.5 nm. These results indicate that an in-register parallel β-sheet structure underlies the [
PSI
+
] prion phenomenon.
Immunomodulatory Activity of Chlorophytum borivilianum Sant. F
Authors: Thakur Mayank , Bhargava Shilpi , Dixit V. K.
Published: December 2006

Chlorophytum borivilianum Santapau & Fernandes (Liliaceae) is a very popular herb in traditional Indian medicine and constitute a group of herbs used as ‘Rasayan’ or adaptogen. Ethanolic extract of the roots and its sapogenin were evaluated for their immunomodulatory activity. Effect of azathioprine‐induced myelosuppresion and administration of extracts on hematological and serological parameters was determined. Administration of extracts greatly improved survival against Candida albicans infection. An increase in delayed‐type hypersensitivity response (DTH), % neutrophil adhesion and in vivo phagocytosis by carbon clearance method was observed after treatment with extracts. Immunostimulant activity of ethanolic extract was more pronounced as compared to sapogenins. The results, thus justifies the traditional use of C. borivilianum as a rasayana drug.
Henry Nicholas Ridley, 1855-1956
Authors: Salisbury Edward James
Published: December 2006

When anyone attains to over a century at the time of their death it is inevitable that there should be few, even of near contemporaries, who can attest to the personal qualities that marked the individual in the full vigour of his career, but this deficiency is less marked with respect to H. N. Ridley, since he retained so much of his vigour and particularly his mental zest until almost the closing years of his life and, moreover, he fortunately left a personal record that has been invaluable in reconstructing the beginnings of his career. The writer is also indebted to his widow and to Mr I. H. Burkill, who succeeded Ridley as Director of the Botanic Gardens, Straits Settlements, from 1912 to 1925, for help in relation to the earlier years. Henry Nicholas Ridley was born on 10 December 1855 at the period when plant physiology under the influence of Dutrochet, Leibig and Boussingault was beginning to affect the general approach to the study of plants, and when Hofmeister had conclusively shown the nature of the sexual process in phanerogams and had given an impetus to the study of the life history of plants. Thus Ridley grew up in a period of great intellectual activity but, above all, in its influence on the young men—the
Origin of Species
appeared when he was four years old. By the time Ridley was a student this had become a vitalizing influence in botanical thought and outlook, which gave a new significance to the study of modes of dispersal of seeds and fruits and to the geographical distribution of plants, that had a lifelong effect on Ridley’s concepts and interests.
William Edward Garner, 1889-1960
Authors: Bawn Cecil Edwin Henry
Published: December 2006

Professor W. E. Garner died on 4 March 1960 at his home at Westburyon-Trym, Bristol, where he had lived for over thirty years. Garner was born at Hugglescote, Leicestershire, on 12 May 1889, the eldest son in a family of three sons and a daughter. His younger brothers also attained distinction in the scientific world: Sir Harry Garner, after notable achievements in the field of aircraft research and development, became Chief Scientist to the Ministry of Supply, and F. H. Garner was for many years until his retirement in 1960 Professor of Chemical Engineering in the University of Birmingham. After attending Market Bosworth Grammar School (1902-1907) Garner went to Birmingham University (1908-1913). He was awarded an 1851 Exhibition in 1913 and proceeded to the University of Gottingen to work with Professor Gustav Tammann. Garner’s research at Gottingen was curtailed by the outbreak of the First World War and he only managed to get out of Germany in time. In the University of Birmingham he carried out research under Professor P. F. Frankland and it is interesting to recall that he began his scientific life as an organic chemist—his first publications being on the preparation of oximes, amines and the reactions of thionyl chloride with lactic acid and ethyl lactate.
David Randall Pye, 1886-1960
Authors: Saunders O. A.
Published: December 2006

David Randall Pye, who died on 20 February 1960, was a scientist and an engineer, although he spent most of his life in government and university administration to which he was called at critical times. From the age of thirty-nine to fifty-seven he devoted himself to building up the scientific research organization of the Air Ministry, at a time when aeronautical developments were so vital to our country’s survival; from fifty-seven until his retirement at sixty-five, he undertook the task, as Provost, of re-establishing University College, London, which had suffered severe blows from the enemy’s air attack. Had there been no war he would almost certainly have spent his life in engineering science, probably in a university, and would have made many more original contributions of the same high quality as those of his earlier years. But although he thus sacrificed his personal research for his country’s needs, he undoubtedly did so partly because of his intense interest in human affairs and in people. He was not by any means a born administrator, or an ambitious organizer, but his wide talents, simple integrity and high standards, enabled him to achieve real success in the administrative work he undertook. Pye was born on 29 April 1886 at Hampstead, London. His early life was spent in the atmosphere of a country home not far from London where he lived with his parents, three brothers and three sisters, David being the sixth in the family. He was a descendant of John Pye of the Mynde, County Hereford, and Anne, daughter of Roger Andrews of Hereford, through their son, Walter Pye of Kilpeck Castle. Another branch of the family, the Edmund Pyes, lived at Blyth, Nottinghamshire, one of whom had a grant of arms from Sir Richard St George, Clarenceux King at Arms, 2 March 1633-1634.
Henry Thomas Tizard, 1885-1959
Authors: Farren William Scott , Jones Reginald Victor
Published: December 2006

Henry Thomas Tizard was born at Gillingham, Kent, on 23 August 1885. His father, Capt. Thomas Henry Tizard, R.N., G.B., F.R.S., was in the hydrographic service of the Navy, of which, in 1891, he was appointed Assistant Hydrographer. His mother was Mary Elizabeth Churchward. H .T .T . was the only son. He had two older and two younger sisters. His father lived until 1924 and his mother until 1931. O n his father’s side, his grandfather was a ship owner and coal merchant at Weymouth. H .T.T. believed that the Tizards were originally Huguenots, who settled in Weymouth early in the 17th century. He had no record of their activities. On his m other’s side, there is evidence of engineering among his ancestors. His grandfather was a civil engineer, first at Malta Dockyard, and later at Pembroke Dockyard. A relatively remote ancestor (1628-1700) on this side was Sir Paul Rycaut, F.R.S., (elected 1666). Little is known about him. He was an author and traveller. H .T .T . had a good memory, particularly for the events of his early childhood—memories of the dockyard at Chatham, and the building of ships, and of sailors encouraging him to climb a rope ladder up a mast. When his father moved to the Admiralty in 1891, the family lived at Surbiton, and here he went to his first school, ‘Enfield House’, kept by three maiden ladies. The mathematics master, Verey, he described as a magnificent teacher —to whom he owed more than he could tell. Indeed, he attributed much of such success as he had in later life to his grounding in mathematics at this school, where he remained for eight years. Following the tradition of his father’s family, he expected to enter the Navy, but in 1899, when due for the Entrance Examination, he discovered a blind patch in his right eye. A specialist said that it would probably clear, which it eventually did. But the Navy being now out of the question it was decided that he should sit for a Scholarship at Westminster. His good mathematical training at his Preparatory School earned him an Exhibition. He was soon awarded a Scholarship, without which it was apparently unlikely that the family finances would have enabled him to remain at Westminster.
John Douglas Cockcroft, 1897-1967
Authors: Oliphant Marcus Laurence Elwin , Penney William George
Published: December 2006

The Cockcroft family settled in Todmorden, on the borders of Lancashire and Yorkshire, not later than the fifteenth century as peasant farmers on the higher ground. In the days of subsistence agriculture, such farmers produced and spun their own wool, and wove their own coarse cloth. By the sixteenth century, some of the inhabitants of the area had become primarily weavers with hand looms, using fibres largely imported from other parts of England and from Ireland. Their light, cheap and gaily coloured materials found a ready market on the Continent, and even in the Americas. Cotton from the Levant was first used by these hand-loom weavers at the beginning of the seventeenth century, sometimes mixed with flax in the weaving. Pure cotton cloth was not produced till after the middle of the eighteenth century, and became of primary importance only after the development of spinning and weaving machinery. There appears to have been a continuous involvement of the Cockcrofts in the weaving industry of the Calder Valley. When hand looms were replaced by power looms, it became necessary to organize larger units employing considerable capital and many operators. Such a mill was founded in Todmorden in 1846 by the Cockcrofts. In 1899 they removed to Birks Mill, Walsden, where a water wheel and steam engine were used as the sources of power. In 1922 electric power was introduced in place of the steam engine, supplemented later by a water turbine working under pressure from their moorside reservoir.
Abram Samoilovitch Besicovitch, 1891-1970
Authors: Burkill John Charles
Published: December 2006

Abram Samoilovitch Besicovitch was born at Berdjansk, on the Sea of Azov, on 24 January 1891, the fourth child of the family of four sons and two daughters of Samuel and Eva Besicovitch. By descent the family belonged to the Karaim people, whose ancestors were the Khazars. The once powerful kingdom of the Khazars (from the 7th to the 11th centuries) stretched between the Volga and the Dnieper. The conversion of sects of the Khazars by the Karaite Jews led to their taking the name Karaims. Their language was originally Turkish of the Qipchaq group but is now mostly Russian. Samuel Besicovitch was a jeweller by trade but, after losses by theft, he gave up his shop and took employment as a cashier. He married Eva when she was 15, and they had to live frugally to bring up their large family. All the children were talented. Moreover, they were united by strong bonds of affection. They all studied at the University at St Petersburg, the older ones in turn earning money in their spare time by giving private lessons and helping to support the younger. All the children gained high qualifications, one brother of A.S. being the author of a number of mathematical books, and another a doctor of medicine. The two daughters both kept up independent careers after marriage. In later life the sons and daughters bore witness to the intelligence of their mother and agreed that, if she had not been cut off from higher education by marrying so young and having children, she would have shown conspicuous ability, notably in mathematics. A.S. acknowledged that he owed to his father (twenty-five years older than his mother) a stern encouragement to persevere to the highest standards. From an early age the boy had shown extraordinary aptitude for solving mathematical problems. One day he brought a textbook to his father saying ‘I have been able to solve every problem except one in this book’. His father withheld praise for this achievement until A.S. had successfully solved the remaining problem.
Leonard Colebrook, 1883-1967
Authors: Oakley Cyril Leslie
Published: December 2006

Leonard Colebrook was born in Guildford, Surrey, on 2 March 1883, the fifth child and third son of May Colebrook and Mary Gower). His father, himself one of a family of seventeen children, became a man of some importance in Guildford, and took a prominent part in social service there; by his first wife he had seven children, and by his second (Mary Gower) six—three boys and three girls. The last child of the marriage was Dora, who also became a bacteriologist. Apart from these facts, Colebrook records nothing significant about his ancestry. He was first educated at the Grammar School, Guildford (1891-1896); from 1896 to 1899 he attended the Westbourne High School, Bournemouth, and from 1899 to 1900 Christ’s College, Blackheath, Kent. He commenced his pre-medical studies in 1900 at the London Hospital Medical College; thence he won an Entrance Scholarship to St Mary’s Hospital, where, having acquired (according to Sir Zachary Cope) a reputation as a quiet diligent student, he graduated M.B., B.S.(Lond.) in 1906, in the minimum possible time. By his own account the teachers that most influenced him were: in chemistry, Dr McCandy of the London Hospital Medical College; in surgery, Mr Augustus Pepper of St Mary’s Hospital, whose house surgeon he was from 1906 to 1907; and, above all, in pathology and bacteriology, Sir Almroth Wright of St Mary’s Hospital Medical School. He had originally, no doubt as one result of a strict nonconformist upbringing, intended to be a medical missionary, but only a year after he qualified he was appointed Assistant to Sir Almroth Wright in the Inoculation Department of St Mary’s Hospital Medical School, where he remained until the outbreak of war in 1914. When beds were allocated to Sir Almroth in which he could give treatment by vaccine therapy, Colebrook was the first resident medical officer appointed to these special wards. He worked in the Department on vaccine therapy from 1907 to 1910, and on vaccine therapy and tuberculosis from 1910 to 1912; in 1912 he worked on pneumonia in Rand miners in Johannesburg with Sir Almroth Wright. The rest of his time before the first World War was spent on work on the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis with artificial pneumothorax.
William Scott Farren, 1892 - 1970
Authors: Thomson George Paget , Hall A. A.
Published: December 2006

William Scott Farren was born in Cambridge on 3 April 1892. I feel I cannot do better than quote from his own record sent to the Royal Society on his election. ‘On my father’s side, the family legend is it came from Ireland, but I know of no records on the point. My great-grandfather was in humble circumstances in Cambridge. My grandfather was, in turn, rose-grower, photographer (the first in Cambridge) and publisher of pictures. He was a great naturalist, particularly Lepidoptera, the friend of most of the chief workers in this field. My father was trained by him, and is (I think) almost equally well-known as lepidopterist and ornithologist. (By profession he was for many years a taxidermist, but has now* a furrier business.) My grandfather’s brother was Robert, well-known as a painter and etcher, particularly of Cambridge. ‘On my mother’s side my grandfather was a chemist. Of his brothers, one was cook at St John’s College, one was manager of Foster’s Bank, and one was the priest of the Roman Catholic Church, and was (I believe) largely responsible for getting it built. ‘My father was relatively unsuccessful in money matters, and we were seldom free from anxiety. But we lived well and found life too interesting to bother much. We had no “holidays” as children do now, but we were left free to roam as far as we liked.
Edward Armand Guggenheim, 1901-1970
Authors: Tompkins Frederick Clifford , Goodeve Charles Frederick
Published: December 2006

Edward Armand Guggenheim was born on 11 August 1901 in Manchester; he was the elder brother of a family of three. His father, Armand Guggenheim, was of Swiss nationality but became a naturalized British subject at the age of forty-six in 1906. He was the senior partner in E. Spinner & Co., importers of Indian cotton and exporters of cotton cloth, especially khaki, and during the years 1917-1923 was also the Swiss Consul in Manchester. Edward after attending Terra Nova School, Birkdale, Southport, proceeded at the age of fourteen with a Junior Scholarship to Charterhouse. At first he was on the classical side but he switched to the science side where he came under the influence of two outstanding mathematics teachers, C. O. Tuckey and Alfred Lodge who was the brother of the more famous Oliver Lodge. His high intellectual qualities developed rapidly at Charterhouse, where he gained a Senior Scholarship in 1917 and was top of the sixth form in mathematical sciences for the period 1918-1920. His strong character and desire for authority were recognized by his election to the Head of House during his last year at School. Edward’s father died at the early age of 63, but his mother lived much longer and was an admirable hostess to Edward’s friends. After declining an Exhibition in the previous year, Edward won a Scholarship from Charterhouse to Cambridge University at Gonville and Caius College in 1920. One year later he obtained a first-class mathematical tripos in Part 1 and in 1923 a first-class in the natural science tripos, Part 2, in chemistry. One imagines that his theoretical papers were outstanding, since his practical ability at that time appears not to have been exceptionally high, particularly in preparative organic chemistry. After completion of an organic synthesis, which should have given a crystalline product, he was holding a test-tube containing a small volume of a viscous tarry material. It is reported that he contrived to collide with a perambulating demonstrator and, with studied carelessness, allowed the only record of his work to slip through his fingers with consequent breakage of the test-tube.
Norman Percy Allen, 1903-1972
Authors: Sykes Charles
Published: December 2006

Norman Percy Allen was born on 5 June 1903, at Wrexham, North Wales, and was the fifth of ten children, seven girls and three boys. His father, Sidney Edward Allen, was an accountant who was employed in the Borough Treasurer’s Department at Wrexham at the time of Norman’s birth. He was one of the large family of a sculptor whose work was mainly on churches and other public buildings. In 1908, he became accountant to the Local Authority at Sheffield and in 1912 was appointed Borough Treasurer of Burton-on-Trent where he lived for the rest of his life. A deeply religious man, he was a very keen, active member of the Congregational Church and a local preacher. His children were all expected to take their part in Church activities and family life was much influenced by his insistence on its principles. This undoubtedly had a strong effect in shaping the characters of all his children. His mother, born Emily Davis, was a kind, intelligent, essentially practical person—very skilled in the domestic arts and an expert dressmaker. Care for her large family, who were very close together in age, left very little time for outside interests other than the Church. Little is known of her family, the remaining members of which are now in Canada. In a large and rather boisterous family, Norman is remembered as the quiet brother who was often absorbed in a book (he was a prolific reader) or in one of his succession of hobbies. He had, however, a keen sense of fun, one expression of which was in the nonsense verse he used to write and illustrate.
James Norman Davidson, 1911-1972
Authors: Neuberger Albert
Published: December 2006

James Norman Davidson was born on 5 March 1911 in Edinburgh, where his father occupied the position of Treasurer of the Carnegie Trust for Scotland. The Edinburgh background and the completely Scottish ancestry had a profound effect on Norman Davidson’s development and his loyalty to Scotland was an important feature of his personality; it influenced him throughout his life. His paternal grandfather, James Davidson, came from the Buchan district of Aberdeenshire and as H.M. Officer of Fisheries was posted for duty in succession to five Scottish fishing ports. Norman’s father, also James Davidson, born in Peterhead in 1873, was the first of four children. He attended the local school in Burghead, but was sent for his secondary education to Elgin Academy, some ten miles away, returning home to Burghead at weekends. On leaving school he trained in a law office in Elgin and in 1896 he joined the firm of Ross and Connel, solicitors in Dunfermline. The principal partner of that firm was Mr (later Sir) John Ross who was a close friend of Andrew Carnegie, the famous industrialist and humanitarian who also hailed from Dunfermline. When the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland was set up in 1901, Ross became its first Treasurer. Shortly afterwards the Trust moved its offices to Edinburgh and James Davidson joined Ross as Assistant Treasurer. When Ross retired in 1923 James Davidson succeeded as Treasurer, a post he held until 1944. He died in 1956.
John Hutchinson, 7 April 1884 - 2 September 1972
Authors: Hubbard C. E.
Published: December 2006

The death of John Hutchinson on 2 September 1972, at the age of 88, removed an international and highly esteemed authority from the ranks of botanical systematists, and the last of the Kew staff with living memories of Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker. He died at the close of a working day, much as he would have wished, after he had made his usual happy visit to the Kew Herbarium. There he was among the plants he loved, in a building which had been almost a second home for him for more than sixty years, and for which he had a deep feeling of affection. At his funeral on 8 September, at Mortlake Crematorium, a wreath in his memory, composed mainly of South African flowers, was sent from the Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew, in the names of his numerous colleagues and friends, many of whom were present. John Hutchinson had risen from very humble positions in the horticultural profession and as a junior assistant in the Kew Herbarium to the Kew botanists of a past generation, to become one of the world’s leading taxonomists, renowned for his extensive botanical publications, especially on the classification of the families and genera of flowering plants, and on the flora of Africa. His vast knowledge of the general morphology and floral structure of the Phanerograms, gained from long and patient studies of the wealth of living and preserved material at Kew, probably exceeded that of any other living botanist. In fact to find another taxonomist with his deep understanding of plant structure and classification and the ability to present botanical data clearly and concisely for a wide range of readers, one has to return to the great names of the past, such as George Bentham and Joseph Dalton Hooker, for whom he had the greatest admiration and respect. Although primarily a taxonomist of the old school, his botanical interests covered a wider field and he did not hesitate to take full advantage of findings in other branches of botany, such as anatomy and phytogeography, when they confirmed or fitted in with his schemes of classification and phylogenetic theories. He was usually known as Hutch, or J. H. to many of his colleagues and friends.
James Chadwick, 20 October 1891 - 24 July 1974
Authors: Massey Harrie Stewart Wilson , Feather Norman
Published: December 2006

Introduction The authors of this jointly written memoir divided its writing between them, one (H. S. W. M.) writing of the life, the other (N. F.) of the scientific work of its subject. Obviously, these two aspects cannot wholly be separated; inevitably some degree of overlap must remain in the two accounts. It is hoped that the reader will be indulgent: at least, every effort has been made to reduce mere repetition to a minimum. Early career— up to the end of World War I James Chadwick was born at Bollington near Macclesfield on 20 October 1891. He had two brothers, and one sister who died at an early age. When his father left the countryside to establish a laundry business in Manchester, Chadwick stayed on with his grandmother and received his primary education at the local school. He showed early aptitude for scholarship but it was not financially possible to send him to Manchester Grammar School for further education. Instead he went to Manchester Municipal Secondary School where the teaching was very good. In the first year at Secondary School he took a wide range of subjects including science and mathematics. The only striking omission, at least for time, was Greek. This was a cause of some regret to Chadwick but, as he himself says, if he had taken Greek he might well have continued with the classics, rather than with science. As time went on he became particularly interested in mathematics and physics though not especially so in chemistry. He was much encouraged by a sixth form master, Mr Wolfenden, to specialize in mathematics and it was his main interest at the time, especially applied mathematics.
Edmund Langley Hirst, 21 July 1898 - 29 October 1975
Authors: Stacey Maurice , Percival Elizabeth
Published: December 2006

Edmund Langley Hirst was born on 21 July 1898 in Preston, Lancashire, and he died in Edinburgh on 29 October 1975. He was the elder son of the Reverend Sim Hirst and Elizabeth HirstnéeLangley). His father’s family had been established in Clayton, near Bradford, Yorkshire for two or three generations. His grandfather and several uncles worked in the woollen mills while other uncles were well known as shopkeepers in Clayton. All this branch of the family were Nonconformists and strong supporters of the local Baptist church. Hirst’s mother was the daughter of Joseph and Mary Langley of Liverpool where Joseph was a flour-merchant and baker. She was born in 1869 and was educated privately, showing a flair for languages. She married Sim in 1897 and survived her husband for many years, dying in March 1955. Her family came from mixed Welsh and North Country stock and had farmed land near Shap for many years. They were all Church of England in religion and his mother retained her C. of E. allegiance although attending her husband´s church and acting fully as a minister’s wife. Hirst was always proud ot the fact that owing to tolerance and understanding on both sides, no hint of any difficulty over religious matters ever disturbed their marriage. Apart from a school teacher cousin, Hirst could not recall that any relatives had achieved academic distinction or prominence in public life. He was perhaps in consequence very proud of the achievements of his brother Sim.
Walter Heinrich Heitler, 2 January 1904 - 15 November 1981
Authors: Mott Nevill Francis
Published: December 2006

Professor Walter Heitler, who died in Zurich on 15 November 1981 in his 78th year, was one of the generation of theoretical physicists who first made their reputations by applying the new quantum mechanics of Born, Heisenberg and Schrodinger to give explanations of the established concepts of physics and chemistry.
Alan Woodworth Johnson, 29 September 1917 - 5 December 1982
Authors: Jones Ewart Ray Herbert , Bonnett Raymond
Published: December 2006

Alan Woodworth Johnson was born in South Shields in 1917. His father, James William Johnson (1883-1955), a nautical optician, was the son of Robert Johnson, a boat builder at John Hunter’s ship yard at Wallsend. In 1910 James Johnson went down to Birkenhead to receive training at the famous Cammell Laird ship yard there, and while in Cheshire he met and married his landlady’s niece, Jeannie Woodworth. He took her back to Northumbria in 1914 when he joined John Lilley and Gillie of North Shields with whom he stayed throughout his working life. It was in South Shields that their eldest son, Alan, was born, but in 1920 the family moved to Forest Hall, a village a few miles northeast of New castle upon Tyne, on the main Eastern Region line (then the London and North Eastern) to Scotland. From 1901, when he went to night classes at Wellington Terrace School, South Shields, James Johnson’s deep involvement with adult education was continuous. He became President of the Price Street School in Birkenhead and back up north he played a similar role at Wellington Terrace, Forest Hall and Westmoor Schools. A member of the Council of the National Adult School Union from 1906, he was at times a member of its Executive and finally, in 1936, its President.
Richard Weck, 5 March 1913 - 9 January 1986
Authors: Wells Alan Arthur , West E. G.
Published: December 2006

Richard Weck was born on 5 March 1913 in Franzensbad, on the river Eger, in Bohemia, which district was then in Austria. It became part of Czechoslovakia when that country was created in 1918, so that Franzensbad was renamed Františkovy Lazňe. It is located near Cheb at the western extremity of the country, and is now within a few kilometres of borders with the German Federal and Democratic Republics. The circumstances of his early childhood were made insecure by these national and political upheavals, which were further exacerbated by the post war depression of 1918. Richard’s father managed a small restaurant in this area of lakes and spas. His mother died young, and his only sister too in a tragic domestic accident. It then became Richard’s responsibility to look after his younger brother. He was capable of outstanding work during his High School days but had to supplement his grant by giving private lessons to less successful students in mathematics, geometry and physics. His leisure was usually spent in earning extra money in the hotel business, which must have conferred on him the seemingly instinctive knowledge of food and wine that distinguished him as a companion during the remainder of his life.
Richard van der Riet Woolley, 24 April 1906 - 24 December 1986
Authors: McCrea William Hunter
Published: December 2006

For the almost three centuries from the appointment of John Flamsteed in 1675 to the retirement of Richard Woolley in 1971, the office of Director of the Royal Observatory and the title Astronomer Royal were deemed inseparable (although just at the outset there had been slight variability in the title’s wording). Flamsteed and his successors were all among Britain’s most distinguished scientists. They included Edmond Halley, in office 1720-42, probably the greatest scientist of the generation after Newton; James Bradley 1742-62, discoverer of optical aberration giving the first direct empirical evidence for the Copernican system ; Nevil Maskelyne 1765-1811, who was the first scientist to weigh the Earth ; Sir George Airy 1835-81, who personally performed most of the functions nowadays requiring a string of research councils; and Sir Frank Dyson 1910-33, who organized the observations at the 1919 solar eclipse that led to the acceptance of the modification of Newton’s law of gravitation proposed by Einstein.
John Zachary Young. 18 March 1907–4 July 1997
Authors: Boycott Brian B.
Published: December 2006

The outstanding zoologist and teacher of zoology at Oxford from 1930 to 1945 was John Zachary Young (universally known as J.Z.). His research was of a distinction that led to his early election to the Royal Society in 1945. In the same year he became Professor of Anatomy and head of department, at University College London (UCL). There he reformed the basic teaching of medical students and built up a diverse and internationally distinguished research department. While at UCL (1945–74) he continued a significant personal research output, which went on for more than 20 years after retirement, first at the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, then at the Department of Experimental Psychology, Oxford. In 1986 he was made an Honorary Fellow of the British Academy for his contributions as a Humanist. He published five books of lectures, about 250 research papers, numerous articles, a research monograph on the Octopus brain and four influential textbooks. He was a powerful and stimulating personality, a remarkable man by any measure, who enormously influenced generations of zoological and medical students through personal contact and through his writings and lectures.
Norman John Berrill. 28 April 1903 — 15 October 1996
Authors: Scriver Charles R.
Published: December 2006

Norman John Berrill, known to colleagues and family as Jack, was born in England, pursued the summit of his career in Canada, had a post-retirement career in the USA, and died at home amid his family in New Hampshire. His reputation as an embryologist was based on analytical studies of the development, morphogenesis and regeneration of invertebrate organisms. At the personal level, his shyness, long silences and penetrating utterances were legendary; as mentor and teacher, he intimidated some and inspired others. I first came to know Professor Berrill as an undergraduate student attending the extraordinary course he taught on invertebrate biology. Looking back over time, this proved to be one of the formative events in my own academic career; later I met Jack Berrill and his family many times and over many years at a warm and gentle personal level. It was at the invitation of his family that I have written this memoir.
Geoffrey Gee, C.B.E. 6 June 1910 — 13 December 1996
Authors: Allen Geoffrey
Published: December 2006

In the early 1930s there was a reluctance to believe that molecules could have molecular masses upwards of 50 000 Da. In 1938 Geoffrey Gee began a fundamental study of polymer solutions that finally removed this doubt. His ultimate achievement was to secure the place of natural rubber against the growing competition from synthetic rubbers. In 1953 he moved on to a distinguished academic career at the University of Manchester.
Reginald Victor Jones, C.H., C.B., C.B.E. 29 September 1911 — 17 December 1997
Authors: Cook Alan
Published: December 2006

R.V. Jones came to Churchill's notice in 1940 when he identified navigational beams for German bombers, and thereafter developed scientific intelligence throughout World War II. Dissatisfied with postwar plans for military intelligence, he became Professor of Natural Philosophy at Aberdeen and from 1946 pursued very precise measurements in physics. He became unsympathetic to academic developments that followed the Robbins Report. The Royal Air Force (RAF), the US Air Force, and intelligence circles in the USA always held him in very high repute. Many thought he never received adequate recognition for his wartime work; his Companionship of Honour came almost too late.
George Francis Mitchell. 15 October 1912 — 25 November 1997
Authors: Watts W.A. , West R.G.
Published: December 2006

George Francis Mitchell, Frank to all who knew him, died peacefully at the age of 85 in October 1997 after a short illness. He was the son of David William Mitchell and Frances Elizabeth Mitchell (
née Kirby
), and had led an extraordinarily distinguished, productive and varied life. The Mitchells were a family of Scottish origin who came to Dublin in the mid-nineteenth century. They were in a variety of businesses, from upholstery for railway carriages to fine fabrics, from furniture and hardware to laboratory suppliers of glassware and chemicals. Frank and his brother David, a consultant physician, and his sister Lillias, who maintained a family tradition as a teacher of fine textiles, were the first generation of the family to experience third-level education.
Sir Alan Herries Wilson. 2 July 1906 — 30 September 1995
Authors: Sondheimer E.H.
Published: December 2006

Alan Wilson was one of the founders of modern theoretical solid-state physics. In two fundamental papers in 1931 he applied band theory to explain the distinction between metals, insulators and semiconductors and to elucidate the mechanism of conduction in semiconductors. These ideas underlie the later invention of the transistor and many of the developments in microelectronics that are revolutionizing today's technology. After World War II, Wilson left academic life to pursue a second, highly distinguished, career in industry.
Dennis Frederick Evans. 27 March 1928 — 6 November 1990
Authors: Green M.L.H. , Griffith W.P.
Published: December 2006

Dennis Evans was an extraordinarily versatile chemist whose interest spanned the conventional boundaries of inorganic, organic and physical chemistry. He made highly individual contributions to all these branches, particularly to inorganic chemistry, nuclear magnetic resonance, magnetism and the reactions of oxygen. His enjoyment of chemistry inspired and delighted those around him.
Sir Alan Lloyd Hodgkin, O.M., K.B.E. 5 February 1914 — 20 December 1998
Authors: Huxley Sir Andrew
Published: December 2006

Alan Hodgkin was one of the leading experimental biologists of the middle years of the twentieth century. He achieved an almost complete understanding of excitation and conduction in nerve fibres at the level possible with the techniques available at that time, and for this he received a share in the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1963. This work paved the way for subsequent unravelling by others of the molecular mechanisms, which followed from improvements in electronic techniques and the growth of molecular genetics. He also made major contributions to other aspects of the physiology of nerves and muscles, and especially to the mechanism of vision. During World War II he worked first in highaltitude physiology but for most of the war he was a member of the team that developed short-wave airborne radar, a development that was crucial to many of the successes of the Royal Air Force. His career was completed by holding two of the most distinguished positions open to an academic scientist in Britain, the presidency of The Royal Society (1970-75) and the Mastership of Trinity College, Cambridge (1978-84). He died in December 1998 after a long series of illnesses.
Ralph Alexander Raphael, C.B.E. 1 January 1921 – 27 April 1998
Authors: Crombie Leslie
Published: December 2006

Ralph Alexander Raphael was born in Croydon on 1 January 1921, the eldest child of Jack Raphael and his wife Lily (née Woolf); there were also three daughters. The paternal family hailed from Poland; Ralph's grandfather, Solomon Raphael, was born in Klatchova. At the age of sixteen, in 1864, he had emigrated via Hamburg and Grimsby to avoid being pressed into the Russian army, and then proceeded to London. There, in 1875, he married Sarah Berg, also from Poland, and they formed a well-balanced pair, as a remarkable photograph reveals. Solomon was a fiery-tempered, soft-hearted and very orthodox Jew: Sarah was calm, efficient, humorous, and a legendary cook. Ralph's father, Jack, was one of their thirteen children.
Dennis Chapman. 6 May 1927 – 28 October 1999
Authors: Quinn Peter J.
Published: December 2006

Dennis Chapman was born on 6 May 1927 in Sunderland, County Durham, the only son of George and Katherine Chapman. His formative years were dominated by the hardships visited on working–class families living in the industrial north of England during the depression of the 1930s and the attentions paid to a major shipbuilding port by the Luftwaffe during the early phase of World War II. He attended Sunderland Junior Technical School from 1938 to 1943, where his parents expected him to learn a trade and make his own way in the world. He left at age 16 without any qualifications.
Albert Edward Green. 11 November 1912 — 12 August 1999
Authors: Chadwick P.
Published: December 2006

Albert Green was one of the most distinguished British applied mathematicians of the twentieth century. His intellectual energy and passion for research were unwavering in a career extending over 63 years. His published work covers a very wide field and includes important contributions to the theoretical mechanics of solids and fluids and the general theory of continuous media.
Michael Rex Horne, O.B.E. 29 December 1921 — 6 January 2000
Authors: Bryan E.R.
Published: December 2006

Michael Rex Horne was born in Leicester on 29 December 1921, the first child of the Reverend Ernest Horne and Katie Horne (
née
Smeeton). Ernest, his father (1882—1959), was born and brought up in Rotherham into a disciplined family of three boys and one girl, and left school at quite an early age (as was usual at that time) to work in a steelworks in Sheffield. He had an ambition to enter the ministry but assumed that his lack of formal education would make this impossible. Encouraged by the minister of a Congregational church in Rotherham, Ernest applied to Paton Theological College in Nottingham, which admitted mature students without traditional qualifications. He was admitted in 1910 and became an accredited Congregational minister in 1914.
Otto Egon Lowenstein. 24 October 1906 – 31 January 1999
Authors: Alexander R. McN.
Published: December 2006

Otto Lowenstein was an outstanding physiologist whose work on fish gave us much of our understanding of the organs of equilibrium in the ear, the semicircular canals and otolith organs.
Sir Mark (Marcus Laurence Elwin) Oliphant, A.C., K.B.E. 8 October 1901 – 14 July 2000
Authors: Bleaney Brebis
Published: December 2006

Marcus Oliphant was a gifted physics student from the University of Adelaide who came to work with Rutherford in Cambridge for his doctorate. In 1937 he became Poynting Professor of Physics at the University of Birmingham, where he promoted the development of centimetre–wave research for radar and was active in connection with the atomic bomb. He returned to Australia in 1950 as Professor of the Physics of Ionized Gases in Canberra, but his efforts there to achieve a thermonuclear reaction were unsuccessful. He became the founding President of the Australian Academy of Sciences, received a knighthood in 1959 and was appointed Governor of Southern Australia in 1972.
Sir Derman Guy Christopherson. 6 September 1915 — 7 November 2000
Authors: Dowson Duncan , Higginson Gordon
Published: December 2006

Derman Christopherson was characterized principally by his kindness and humanity, recognized by all who knew him, in any capacity. Those who came into contact with him professionally soon appreciated his physical insight and his versatility—he was equally at home with solid and fluid mechanics and he had considerable mathematical skills. He recommended to his graduate students that success came from the ability ‘to bring home the bacon in a number of fields’. He was an inspirational supervisor—informal, personal, friendly. In relatively few papers he contributed significant applications in elasticity, plasticity and viscous flow, and pioneered the application of Southwell's relaxation method to the solution of engineering problems.
Sir George Robert Edwards OM CBE. 9 July 1908 — 2 March 2003
Authors: Barfield Norman
Published: December 2006

British engineering has always been well provided with world–class designers and industrial leaders who have wrought world–leading achievements. Best and most widely known for his exceptional contribution to the world aerospace industry, Sir George Edwards excelled in all three spheres simultaneously, and was the most prolifically accomplished and highestregarded British aircraft designer and industrial leader after the original pioneers and company signatories, and of world stature. His 94–year life spanned virtually the entire era of powered manned flight, to which he devoted an outstanding 40–year contribution―from 1935 to 1975, from the biplane to the supersonic era. His exceptional technical and engineering proficiency, familial leadership style, prolific achievements and hugely significant influence on the global aeronautical scene were unmatched anywhere. The results were the generation of leading–edge aerospace engineering technologies and standards, the realization of a whole new travel experience throughout the world by air, and key elements of national and international defence, thereby providing valuable commercial and export benefits and many thousands of high–calibre and rewarding jobs―all of which he steered and managed with commanding ability, authority, effect and great success.
Eric John Hewitt. 27 February 1919 – 1 January 2002
Authors: Bergersen Fraser J.
Published: December 2006

Eric Hewitt was a plant physiologist, distinguished internationally for his research on the detection of deficiencies in trace elements in the mineral nutrition of plants and for elucidating the biochemical roles of some of these elements, particularly in the reduction of nitrate and nitrite ions. The research of his laboratory at Long Ashton Research Station, Bristol, was based on the meticulous applications of basic inorganic chemistry to techniques for sand–and–solution culture of experimental plants. Typically, trace elements are required by plants in concentrations of a few parts per million in the substrate in which they are grown. Consequently, to detect and measure effects of such nutrient elements on the growth of experimental plants, it is necessary to remove traces of these elements from the sand medium and from the plant nutrient solutions. His methods achieved astonishingly low levels of contaminating trace elements in plant growth media (Russell 1966, pp. 361–371). The element under study is then added to the test plant cultures at low concentration, and the growth and composition in test and control plants are compared. Hewitt's initial contribution was to devise techniques that could achieve such objectives. These techniques have been applied to solve problems of plant nutrition in agriculture and horticulture in many countries and they were the foundation on which his achievements in plant biochemistry were built.
Sir Edgar William John Mitchell CBE. 25 September 1925 – 30 October 2002
Authors: Cowley Roger A.
Published: December 2006

William Mitchell was a skilled experimental physicist who made important contributions to British physics both at the university level, as head of department in both Reading and Oxford universities, and as Chairman of the Science Research Council from 1985 to 1990. He left a permanent mark on the direction of science in the UK through his encouragement of others, through the creation of interdisciplinary research centres and through his enthusiasm for central facilities.
First photographs of the canals of Mars
Authors: Lowell Percival
Published: December 2006

To make the canals of Mars write their own record on a photographic plate, so that astronomers might have at first hand objective proof of their reality, has long been one of the objects of this observatory. The endeavour has at last succeeded. Unnecessary as such corroboration was to the observers themselves, it is different with the world at large; for the work of the camera at once puts the canals in a position where scientists in general, as well as astronomers in particular, are able to judge the phenomena. The difficulties in the way, however, at first proved insuperable. The main markings of the planet were secured by the camera here four years ago, but to get the canals to show was a matter of an altogether different order of difficulty from that of celestial photography in general. This will be appreciated on recalling Richey’s excellent photographs of the moon, within the wall of one of whose smaller craters the whole disc of the planet might be enclosed. When it is further considered that the delicate detail on this disc bears to it the same relative ratio that the craters themselves do to the whole moon, the almost impossible task of reproducing the canals will be understood.