Bertram Brockhouse, Nobel-winning physicist

By Associated Press, 10/16/2003

TORONTO -- Bertram Brockhouse, who shared the 1994 Nobel Prize in physics with MIT professor Clifford Shull, died Monday in Hamilton, Ont., after years of declining health. He was 85.

Dr. Brockhouse and Shull were awarded the Nobel Prize for developing methods of neutron scattering techniques for studies of condensed matter. Using beams of neutrons the same way a microscope uses light, the researchers were able to reveal the structure and movement of atoms. Essentially, Dr. Brockhouse and Shull, working separately, helped answer the questions of what atoms are and what they do.

Shull, a Lexington, Mass., resident, died in 2001.

Dr. Brockhouse carried out his research at some of the world's first nuclear reactors.

Ironically, Dr. Brockhouse and Shull were not interested in nuclear power. They merely used the primitive research reactors to study how neutrons are scattered when bouncing against atoms.

The groundbreaking research led several governments and institutions to pour billions of dollars into special facilities for neutron scattering. Researchers now use neutron scattering to study virus and DNA molecules.

A professor at McMaster University, Dr. Brockhouse was the only one of Canada's 14 Nobel Prize winners who was born, educated, and completed his life's work in the country.

"He was a heroic figure in our community and in material science," said Bruce Gaulin, a professor of physics at McMaster, who holds a research chair named in Dr. Brockhouse's honor. He leaves his wife, Doris, six children, and 10 grandchildren.