Leon Max Lederman, physicist, educator, and advocate for basic research, has spent his scientific career designing experiments and devices for unlocking the structure of the atom . During the heyday of physics research at Columbia University in New York City, Lederman participated in pioneering experiments that proved the existence of a new kind of neutrino --a subatomic particle not observed previously. These experiments also established a new technique for probing physical phenomena involving the "weak" nuclear force, one of the three fundamental forces that rule the atom. For this work, Lederman shared in the 1988 Nobel Prize for physics.

Lederman, son of Russian immigrants Morris Lederman and Minna Rosenberg, was born on July 15, 1922, in New York City, where his father operated a laundry. Lederman pursued his undergraduate education at the City College of New York, earning a baccalaureate degree in chemistry in 1943. After serving three years in the U.S...