-
Niels Bohr was born in Copenhagen, Denmark on October 7, 1885. There he was raised by both parents. His mother was from a family of educated members and his father was an eminent physiologist, which sparked his interest in physics.
-
After completion of grammar school in 1903, he continued his education at Copenhagen University for physics, entering his masters program in 1909 moving onto his doctorate in 1911.
-
In 1912, Niels Bohr married Margrethe Norlund and had six sons who, all but one, followed their father into physics in the ranks of Nobel prize winners.
-
In 1920, Bohr returned to Denmark as a professor at the University of Copenhagen. He founded the institute for theoretical physics sponsored by the Carlsberg brewery. He remained the director until his absence during WWII. After Hitler took power, Bohr was concerned for his Jewish colleagues, offering a place for many scientists to live and work.
-
In 1922, he received the Nobel Prize for his work in his work understanding the atomic model of electrons and how they behaved at the quantum level. The idea of complementarity that things may have a dual nature, but can only experience one aspect at a time.
-
He later donated his gold Nobel medal to the Finnish war effort. Then, in 1939 Bohr visited the U.S. with news from Lise Meitner that the German scientist were working on splitting the atom which sparked the U.S. to establish the Manhattan project developing the atomic bomb.
-
In 1942, Bohr and his family fled to Sweden in a fishing boat because the German army occupied Denmark.
-
In 1955, He went on to organize the atoms for the Peace Conference in Geneva. He helped found CERN, the particle accelerator which led to many major discoveries and research capabilities.
-
In 1962, Bohr died of a stroke at home. A quote by Bohr- "An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes which can be made, in a very narrow field."