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Patrick Maynard Stuart Blackett, Baron Blackett (18 November 1897 – 13 July 1974) was a British physicist and life peer who received the 1948 Nobel Prize in Physics. In 1925, he was the first person to prove that radioactivity could cause the nuclear transmutation of one chemical element to another. He also made major contributions to the Allied war effort in World War II, advising on military strategy and developing operational research.
In the war's aftermath, Blackett continued his scientific work, but also became outspoken on political matters. He advocated for restraints on the military use of atomic energy. He was a proponent for Third World development and for reducing the gap between rich and poor. In the 1950s and '60s, he was a key advisor to the Labour Party on science and technology policy. By the time of his death in 1974, Blackett had become controversial to the point that the The Times obituary referred to him as the "Radical Nobel-Prize Winning Physicist".
In August 1914 at the outbreak of World War I, Blackett was assigned to active service as a midshipman. He was transferred to the Cape Verde Islands on HMS Carnarvon and was present at the Battle of the Falkland Islands. He was then transferred to HMS Barham and saw much action at the Battle of Jutland. While on the Barham, Blackett was co-inventor of a gunnery device on which the Admiralty took out a patent. In 1916, he applied to join the RNAS but his application was refused. In October of that year, he became a sub-lieutenant on HMS P17 on Dover patrol, and in July 1917 he was posted to HMS Sturgeon in the Harwich Force under Admiral Tyrwhitt. Blackett was concerned by the poor quality of British gunnery in the Harwich Force when compared with that of the enemy. In May 1918, he was promoted to lieutenant, but by then had decided to leave the Navy. He started to read science textbooks as he planned his post-war career.
In January 1919, the Admiralty sent the officers whose training had been interrupted by the war to the University of Cambridge for a course of general duties. On his first night at Magdalene College, Cambridge, he met Kingsley Martin and Geoffrey Webb, later recalling that he had never before, in his naval training, heard intellectual conversation. Blackett was impressed by the prestigious Cavendish Laboratory, and left the Navy to study mathematics and physics at Cambridge.
Rutherford had discovered that the nucleus of the nitrogen atom could be disintegrated by firing fast alpha particles into nitrogen. He asked Blackett to use a cloud chamber to find visible tracks of this disintegration, and by 1925, Blackett had taken 23,000 photographs showing 415,000 tracks of ionized particles. Eight of these were forked, and this showed that the nitrogen atom-alpha particle combination had formed an atom of fluorine, which then disintegrated into an isotope of oxygen 17 and a proton. Blackett published the results of his experiments in 1925. He thus became the first person to deliberately transmute one chemical element into another.
During his time at Cambridge, Blackett was the head tutor of the young American graduate student, J. Robert Oppenheimer. The latter's desire to study theoretical physics rather than focus on lab work brought him into conflict with Blackett. While seeking help for a psychiatric breakdown induced by the demanding Blackett, Oppenheimer admitted to trying to poison his tutor with an apple laced with toxins.
Blackett spent time in 1924–25 in Göttingen, Germany, working with James Franck on atomic spectra. In 1932, Blackett partnered with Giuseppe Occhialini to devise a system of which took photographs only when a cosmic ray particle traversed the chamber. They found 500 tracks of high energy cosmic ray particles in 700 automatic exposures. In 1933, Blackett discovered fourteen tracks which confirmed the existence of the positron and revealed the now instantly recognisable opposing spiral traces of positron/electron pair production. He and Occhialini published their findings in a landmark 1933 paper in Proceedings of the Royal Society A. Blackett's contribution to this discovery was a key reason he was later awarded the Nobel Prize. This work, combined with his research on annihilation radiation, made Blackett a leading expert in the new theory of antimatter.
That same year, he moved to Birkbeck, University of London, as professor of Physics, and stayed for four years. In 1937, he went to the Victoria University of Manchester where he was elected to the Langworthy Professorship and created a major international research laboratory. The Blackett Memorial Hall and Blackett Lecture Theatre at the University of Manchester were subsequently named after him. He was elected to membership of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society on 14 December 1937.
In 1947, Blackett introduced Blackett effect to account for the Earth's magnetic field as a function of its rotation, with the hope that it would unify both the electromagnetic force and the force of gravity. He spent a number of years developing high-quality to test his theory, but eventually found it to be without merit. However, his work on the subject led him into geophysics, where he later helped process data relating to paleomagnetism, and also provided strong evidence for continental drift.
He was awarded the 1948 Nobel Prize in Physics for his investigation of cosmic rays using his invention of the counter-controlled cloud chamber.
In 1948, he was awarded the Dalton Medal from the Manchester Literary and Philosophical SocietyMemoirs And Proceedings Of The Manchester Literary And Philosophical Society Volume 152 2013-14
In 1953, he was appointed head of the Physics Department at Imperial College London, and retired from there in July 1963. The Physics department building of Imperial College, the Blackett Laboratory, is named in his honour.
In 1957, Blackett gave the presidential address ("Technology and World Advancement") to the British Association meeting in Dublin In 1965, he delivered the MacMillan Memorial Lecture to the Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders in Scotland. He chose the subject "Continental Drift".
In August 1940, Blackett became scientific adviser to Lieutenant General Sir Frederick Pile, Commander in Chief of Anti-Aircraft Command and thus began the work that resulted in the field of study known as operational research (OR). He was director of Operational Research with the Admiralty from 1942 to 1945, and his work with E. J. Williams improved the survival odds of , presented counter-intuitive but correct recommendations for the armour-plating of aircraft, and achieved many other successes. His aim, he said, was to base military strategy on numbers, not "gusts of emotions". During the war he criticised the assumptions in Lord Cherwell's dehousing paper and sided with Tizard who argued that fewer resources should go to RAF Bomber Command for the area bombing offensive and more to the other armed forces. Blackett's studies had shown the ineffectiveness of the area bombing strategies, as opposed to the importance of fighting off the Germany U-boats, which were heavily affecting the war effort with their sinkings of merchant ships. In this opinion, he chafed against the existing military authority and was cut out of various circles of communications. However, after the war, the Allied Strategic Bombing Survey proved Blackett correct.
Blackett's internationalism found expression in his strong support for India. In 1947 he met Jawaharlal Nehru, who sought the scientist's advice on the research and development needs of the Indian armed forces. For the next 20 years, Blackett was a frequent visitor and advisor to India on military and civil science. These visits deepened his concern for the underprivileged and the poor. He was convinced that their problems could be overcome by applying science and technology. He used his prestige in the scientific community to try to persuade fellow scientists that one of their first duties should be to help ensure a decent life for all mankind. Before underdevelopment became a popular issue, Blackett proposed in a 1957 presidential address to the British Association for the Advancement of Science that his country should devote 1% of its national income to the Development aid, and he was later one of the prime movers in the founding of the Overseas Development Institute.
During the 13 years when the Labour Party was out of office, Blackett was the senior member of a group of scientists who met regularly to discuss scientific and technological policy. This group grew in influence when Harold Wilson assumed leadership of the Party. Blackett's suggestions directly led to the creation of the Ministry of Technology as soon as the Wilson government was formed, and he insisted that a top priority should be revival of Britain's computer industry. Blackett did not enter open politics, but worked for a year as a civil servant. He remained deputy chairman of the Minister's Advisory Council throughout the administration's life, and was also personal scientific adviser to the Minister.
Blackett married Costanza Bayon (1899–1986) in March 1924. They had a son and a daughter.
The Blackett Laboratory is part of Imperial College Faculty of Natural Sciences and has housed the Physics Department since its completion in 1961.
Blackett died on 13 July 1974 at age 76. His ashes are buried in the Kensal Green Cemetery, London.
Bernard Lovell wrote of Blackett: "Those who worked with Blackett in the laboratory were dominated by his immensely powerful personality, and those who knew him elsewhere soon discovered that the public image thinly veiled a sensitive and humane spirit".
Edward Bullard said that he was the most versatile and best loved physicist of his generation and that his achievement was also without rival: "he was wonderfully intelligent, charming, fun to be with, dignified and handsome".
In 2016, the house that Blackett lived in from 1953 to 1969 (48 Paultons Square, Chelsea, London) received an English Heritage blue plaque.
In July 2022, the Royal Navy named an experimental ship after Blackett in honour of his service to the Royal Navy and to the country; XV Patrick Blackett will be used by the Royal Navy to experiment with autonomous technologies.
(2025). 9780375412028, Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 9780375412028 Blackett did not eat the apple and no punitive action was taken against Oppenheimer for the attempted poisoning.
World War II and operational research
In 1935, Blackett was invited to join the Aeronautical Research Committee chaired by Henry Tizard. The committee was effective in advocating for the early installation of Radar for air defence. At the beginning of World War II, Blackett served on various committees and spent time at the Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE) Farnborough, where he made a major contribution to the design of the Mark XIV bomb sight, which allowed bombs to be released without a level bombing run beforehand. In 1940–41, he served on the MAUD Committee which concluded that an atomic bomb was feasible. He disagreed with the committee's conclusion that Britain could produce an atomic bomb by 1943, and he recommended that the project should be discussed with the Americans. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 1933 and awarded its Royal Medal in 1940.
Politics
While an undergraduate, Blackett befriended Kingsley Martin, the future editor of the New Statesman; their talks on politics contributed to Blackett's move to the left. He later identified himself as a socialist, and often campaigned on behalf of the Labour Party. In the aftermath of World War II, Blackett became known for his radical political opinions, which included a belief that Britain ought not to develop atomic weapons. His biographer Mary Jo Nye noted: As a result of these controversies, Blackett was considered too far to the left for the post-war Labour Government to employ, and he returned to academic life.
Publications
Influence in fiction
Personal life
Blackett was an agnostic or atheist. He had refused many honours, in the manner of a radical of the 1920s, but accepted appointment as Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour in the 1965 Birthday Honours, and was appointed to the Order of Merit in 1967. He was created a life peer on 27 January 1969 as Baron Blackett, of Chelsea in Greater London. He was made President of the Royal Society in 1965. The crater Blackett on the Moon is named after him.
In popular culture
Blackett was portrayed by James D'Arcy in the 2023 film Oppenheimer.
See also
Further reading
(2025). 9780957567504, The Blacketts. ISBN 9780957567504
External links
Categories: 1897 Births, 1974 Deaths, 20th-century British Physicists, Academics Of Birkbeck, University Of London, Academics Of Imperial College London, Academics Of The Victoria University Of Manchester, Alumni Of King's College, Cambridge, Alumni Of Magdalene College, Cambridge, British Operations Researchers, English Nobel Laureates, British Nobel Laureates, Fellows Of King's College, Cambridge, English Atheists, British Agnostics, British Experimental Physicists, Fellows Of The Royal Society, Foreign Associates Of The National Academy Of Sciences, Foreign Members Of The Ussr Academy Of Sciences, Labour Party Life Peers, Life Peers Created By Elizabeth Ii, Members Of The Fabian Society, Members Of The Order Of Merit, Members Of The Order Of The Companions Of Honour, Nobel Laureates In Physics, Presidents Of The British Science Association, Presidents Of The Royal Society, Recipients Of The Copley Medal, Royal Medal Winners, People Educated At The Royal Naval College, Osborne, Members Of The German Academy Of Sciences At Berlin, Deans Of The Royal College Of Science, Recipients Of The Dalton Medal, Tectonicists, Burials At Kensal Green Cemetery, Royal Navy Personnel Of World War Ii, People From Kensington
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