1915-1990

American Physicist

Corecipient of the 1961 Nobel Prize in physics, Robert Hofstadter discovered that protons and neutrons are not indivisible particles, as was previously believed, but are complex components of the atom. He also developed the sodium iodide-thallium scintillator, a device for measuring radiation still used in particle accelerators.

Hofstadter was born in New York City on February 5, 1915, the third of four children born to Louis (a salesman) and Henrietta Koenigsberg Hofstadter. He went to public schools, then enrolled at the City College of New York (now the City University of New York). Hofstadter graduated magna cum laude with a B.S. in physics in 1935, and earned the Kenyon Prize for exceptional achievement in mathematics and physics.

Robert Hofstadter. (The Library of Congress. Reproduced with permission.)

He later earned M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Princeton University, completing his work in 1938 but remaining at Princeton...