Cavendish Laboratory: Difference between revisions

| endowment =

| head_label = Head of department

| free_label = [[Cavendish Professor of Physics]]

| free = Vacant

[[File:Sir Ernest Rutherfords laboratory, early 20th century. (9660575343).jpg|thumb|Sir Ernest Rutherford's physics laboratory- early 20th century]]

 

 

Professor [[James Clerk Maxwell]], the developer of [[electromagnetic theory]], was a founder of the laboratory and the first [[Cavendish Professor of Physics]].<ref>Dennis Moralee, [http://www.phy.cam.ac.uk/history/old_maxwell.php "Maxwell's Cavendish"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130915013523/http://www.phy.cam.ac.uk/history/old_maxwell.php |date=2013-09-15 }}, from the booklet "A Hundred Years and More of Cambridge Physics"</ref> The Duke of Devonshire had given to Maxwell, as head of the laboratory, the manuscripts of Henry Cavendish's unpublished ''Electrical Works''. The editing and publishing of these was Maxwell's main scientific work while he was at the laboratory. Cavendish's work aroused Maxwell's intense admiration and he decided to call the Laboratory (formerly known as the Devonshire Laboratory) the Cavendish Laboratory and thus to commemorate both the Duke and Henry Cavendish.<ref>[http://www-outreach.phy.cam.ac.uk/camphy/museum/area1/maxwell.htm "James Clerk Maxwell"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150224014615/http://www-outreach.phy.cam.ac.uk/camphy/museum/area1/maxwell.htm# |date=2015-02-24 }}, Cambridge University</ref><ref name=austin>{{cite web |url=http://www.austinmemories.com/page160/page160.html |title=Austin Wing of the Cavendish Laboratory |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121121233127/http://www.austinmemories.com/page160/page160.html |archive-date=2012-11-21}}</ref>

 

==Biology==

 

The discovery was made on 28 February 1953; the first Watson/Crick paper appeared in ''[[Nature (journal)|Nature]]'' on 25 April 1953. Sir [[Lawrence Bragg]], the director of the Cavendish Laboratory, where Watson and Crick worked, gave a talk at [[Guy's Hospital]] Medical School in London on Thursday 14 May 1953 which resulted in an article by Ritchie Calder in the ''[[News Chronicle]]'' of London, on Friday 15 May 1953, entitled "Why You Are You. Nearer Secret of Life." The news reached readers of ''[[The New York Times]]'' the next day; Victor K. McElheny, in researching his biography, ''Watson and DNA: Making a Scientific Revolution'', found a clipping of a six-paragraph ''New York Times'' article written from London and dated 16 May 1953 with the headline "Form of `Life Unit' in Cell Is Scanned." The article ran in an early edition and was then pulled to make space for news deemed more important. (''The New York Times'' subsequently ran a longer article on 12 June 1953). The Cambridge University undergraduate newspaper ''[[Varsity (Cambridge)|Varsity]]'' also ran its own short article on the discovery on Saturday 30 May 1953. Bragg's original announcement of the discovery at a [[Solvay Conference]] on [[proteins]] in Belgium on 8 April 1953 went unreported by the British press.

[[File:CavendishLab.jpg|thumb|Southern aspect of the laboratory at its current site, viewed from across 'Payne's Pond']]

[[File:Cavendish Laboratory III.jpg|thumb|The third iteration of the Cavendish Laboratory under construction in 2020 on its new site at JJ Thomson Avenue]]

 

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# [[John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh]] (Physics, 1904)

# [[Charles Glover Barkla]] (Physics, 1917)

# [[Francis William Aston]] (Chemistry, 1922)

# [[Arthur Compton]] (Physics, 1927)

# Sir [[Owen Willans Richardson]] (Physics, 1928)

# Sir [[James Chadwick]] (Physics, 1935)

# Sir [[Edward Victor Appleton]] (Physics, 1947)

# [[Patrick Blackett, Baron Blackett]] (Physics, 1948)

# [[Ernest Walton]] (Physics, 1951)

# [[Francis Crick]] (Physiology or Medicine, 1962)

# [[Max Perutz]] (Chemistry, 1962)

# Sir [[John Kendrew]] (Chemistry, 1962)

# [[Brian Josephson]] (Physics, 1973)

# Sir [[Martin Ryle]] (Physics, 1974)

{{Main|Cavendish Professor of Physics}}

The Cavendish Professors were the heads of the department until the tenure of Sir Brian Pippard, during which period the roles separated.

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# [[John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh]]<ref name=strutt>{{MacTutor Biography|id=Rayleigh|title=John William Strutt}}</ref> 1879–1884

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† ''Jacksonian Professors of Natural Philosophy''

Areas in which the Laboratory has been influential include:-

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*Superconductivity [[Josephson junction]], led by [[Brian Pippard]]<ref name=pippard/>

*Structure and Dynamics Group,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.sd.phy.cam.ac.uk |title=Structure and Dynamics Group |access-date=2018-11-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151124083122/http://www.sd.phy.cam.ac.uk/# |archive-date=2015-11-24 |url-status=dead}}</ref> led by Jacqui Cole

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==Cavendish staff==

 

===Notable senior academic staff===

 

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# [[Jacqui Cole]], Professor of Molecular Engineering

# [[Stephen Gull]], University Professor of Physics

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===Other notable alumni===

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*[[Louis Harold Gray]]

*[[Olga Kennard]]

*[[Andrew D. Maynard]] at Arizona State University

*[[John Rodenburg]]

*[[Henry Snaith]]