The 1922 Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine recognized Archibald Hill for his discoveries relating to heat production and oxygen use in muscles. Prior to this distinction Hill was knighted for his military work during World War I and elected a member into the Royal Society, both in 1918. He represented Cambridge University in Parliament during World War II, and also served on the War Cabinet Scientific Advisory Committee. It was only after the war, and his retirement in 1952, that Hill returned to research into the physiology of the muscles.

Sir Archibald Vivian Hill was born in Bristol, England, into a family that had been in the lumber business for five generations. Hill's mother, Ada Priscilla Rumney Hill, raised Hill and his younger sister after their father, Jonathan Hill, deserted the family when Hill was three. Until age seven, his mother educated him at home, but when the family moved...