The German physicist Max von Laue (1879-1960) was the first to use x-rays to study the arrangement of atoms in crystals. His work in x-ray crystallography earned him the Nobel Prize in physics in 1914.

Max Theodor Felix von Laue was born on October 9, 1879, in Pfaffendorf, Germany. His father was a civilian official in German military administration who in 1913 was raised to the hereditary nobility (hence the von in the family name). In the early 1890s the young von Laue gained a passionate interest in physics that lasted until his death some 60 years later.

Von Laue received his scientific training at the universities of Strasbourg, Munich, and Göttingen. He was awarded a doctorate in mathematics and physics by the University of Berlin (1903) where he came under the influence of Max Planck, one of the greatest physicists of the 20th century. In the fall of 1905 Planck offered von...