Nobel physics laureate Bertram Brockhouse dies at 85

TORONTO (AP) — Bertram Brockhouse, who shared the 1994 Nobel Prize in physics with American Clifford Shull, has died after years of declining health, his associates said. He was 85.

Brockhouse died Monday in Hamilton, Ontario, according to a posting on the McMaster University Web site. He was a professor emeritus at the university located 65 kilometers (40 miles) southwest of Toronto. No cause of death was given.

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 as a microscope uses light, the researchers were able to reveal the structure and movement of atoms. Essentially, Brockhouse and Shull helped answer the questions of what atoms are and what they do.

Shull died in 2001.

Brockhouse carried out his research in the years following World War II at some of the first nuclear reactors.

Ironically, Brockhouse and Shull were never 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.

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 Brockhouse’s honor. “He was an almost larger than life figure for this university and the Canadian physics community.”

Brockhouse was born in Lethbridge, Alberta, and served as a military electrical technician during World War II. He then obtained degrees in math and physics at the University of British Columbia and the University of Toronto.

He is survived by his wife, Doris, six children and 10 grandchildren. Funeral plans were pending.