Fellow and physics tutor.
I am also a Vice President of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, and until 2005 I was Professor of Astronomy at Gresham College, London.
I am a theoretical high energy particle physicist, and in addition to my research (of which more below if you read that far) I am dedicated to the public understanding of science. In this context I gave the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures in 1993, titled "The Cosmic Onion" and written several popular books about science, of which "Lucifer's Legacy" asks why there is anything in the universe at all, and the latest (publication 25 October 2007) titled "The Void" is all about nothing. I won the Kelvin Medal of the Institute of Physics in 1996 for contributions to the public understanding of physics. Amongst my publications "The Cosmic Onion", (Heinemann) has been widely used by schools, and also a graduate textbook "Introduction to Quarks and Partons" (Academic Press) has been popular.
I come from Peterborough and at school was taught Latin by John Dexter, brother of Colin Dexter the creator of Inspector Morse. Some forty years later I discovered that my teaching room at Exeter overlooks the spot where Morse met his end. The implications of this are under investigation.
I was an undergraduate at St Andrews University and then came to Oxford (Magdalen College) to do my D.Phil. From Oxford I went first to Stanford, California for two years as a postdoctoral fellow and then to CERN Geneva. I joined Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in 1975 as a research physicist and was latterly Head of Theoretical Physics Division. I was there for 25 years apart from some periods at Oak Ridge Tennessee and at CERN, where I headed their communication and public education activites from 1997-2000.
That was what I was doing in the last millenium. For the new millenium (which in my opinion began on 01.01.01) I have joined Exeter College where I am a Fellow teaching physics, and doing research in the Theoretical Physics department.
My research is concerned with the quark structure of matter. Quarks are glued together inside particles like the proton, but unable to get out. Quite why this is, is still not totally understood, and my research is into phenomenological ways of solving this puzzle. I am intrigued by the possibility that there could be particles consisting purely of glue - so called "glueballs". I have proposed that "hybrids", where the glue is activated in the presence of quarks, could be a new spectroscopy with specially sharp features that could teach us about the gluey forces that entrap the quarks. I am eagerly waiting for someone to establish that they exist. In the meantime I will continue to enjoy playing squash, writing, walking and singing.
