Nevill Francis Mott
British theoretical physicist
Who was Nevill Francis Mott?
Sir Nevill Francis Mott (30 September 1905 – 8 August 1996) was a British theoretical physicist who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1977 for his work on the electronic structure of magnetic and disordered systems, especially amorphous semiconductors. Nevill Francis Mott was born in Leeds, England, the son of Charles Francis Mott and Lilian Mary Reynolds, a granddaughter of Sir John Richardson, and great granddaughter of Sir John Henry Pelly, 1st Baronet. Nevill grew up first in the village of Giggleswick in the West Riding of Yorkshire, where his father was Senior Science Master at Giggleswick School. His mother also taught Maths at the School. The Prize was shared with Philip W. Anderson and John Van Vleck. The three had conducted loosely related research. Mott and Anderson clarified the reasons why magnetic or amorphous materials can sometimes be metallic and sometimes insulating.
Historical significance
Miss Reynolds was a Cambridge Mathematics Tripos graduate and at Cambridge was the best woman mathematician of her year. His parents met in the Cavendish Laboratory, when both were engaged in physics research under J. J. Thomson.