Read article: Secret letters cast light on Copenhagen
When the author Michael Frayn spent two years writing Copenhagen, he had no idea how successful the play would become. He doubted that audiences would sit through a historical drama about a war-time m...
Read article: Isaac Newton: the gifted genius
It seems unlikely that we will ever lose our fascination for the man whom David Berlinski calls “the largest figure in the history of Western science” and the author of “the greatest...
Read article: Not the right stuff
Almost 40 years later, as the International Space Station takes shape, history is repeating itself. Of course, the space station has never been a scientific mission – its main purpose has always...
I was recently 60 feet underground in the museum attached to the old operations room of 11 group at Uxbridge, one of the nerve centres of the Battle of Britain, staring at pictures of senior Royal Air...
Read article: Dirac, Einstein and physics
Our greatest endeavour in basic science over the past century has, undoubtedly, been the study of the electromagnetic, strong and weak forces. Although the general theory of relativity was formulated ...
Read article: Physics: past, present, future
What happens when you ask some of the world's leading physicists seven questions about the past, present and future of physics?
Read article: Atomic secrets and the red scare
Almost everyone has heard of the “Oppenheimer affair”. It took place between 1953-54 when the father of the atomic bomb, Robert Oppenheimer, was subjected to a humiliating show trial by th...
Outside it is a warm May evening, as two friends sit deep in discussion in a coffee house in Berne. “Besso, you must help me, I think I am going mad. How is it even thinkable that a light ray co...
Read article: Paul Dirac: the purest soul in physics
Paul Dirac published the first of his papers on "The Quantum Theory of the Electron" 70 years ago this month. The Dirac equation, derived in those papers, is one of the most important equations in phy...
Reviewed by John Maddox If war is too important to be left to the generals, then surely the research community should be on its guard against leaving the history of discovery to the historians of scie...
