ABSTRACT
A s is true in every sphere o f human activity, popular myth notwithstanding, few scientists have been thrust from obscurity into the ultra-elite. The youngest laureate by far was the English physicist W. L. Bragg, who was 25 when he shared the prize with his famous father, W. H . Bragg. But even by that early age, he had acquired a public identity in physics through several years of collaborating with the elder Bragg on their pioneering work in X-ray crystallography. Similarly, the most youthful Am ericans who received the prize-Joshua Lederberg, T. D . Lee, C. N . Yang, and James W atson, for exam ple-had already been widely recognized for their work. The great majority who received the prize at a later age-such as G eorge Beadle, R . B. W oodward, Linus Pauling, Richard Feynm an, and Eugene Wigner-had of course been acknowledged members of the scientific elite for years.
