David Gross was fascinated by the mysterious world of physics since childhood. He was enchanted by the evolution of riddles, and how from cracking one riddle, yet another one emerges. When he received his doctorate degree from Harvard University, he was challenged with the following riddle: I am whimsical, no one has ever seen me but I am the ...

Arno Penzias was born in 1933 in Munich, Germany. In 1939 his family emigrated to the United States. Arno Penzias was awarded the Nobel prize for physics in 1978, Together with Robert Wilson, "for their discovery of cosmic background radiation", the echoes of the creation of the universe in the `big bang', eighteen billion years ago. Penzias' ...

Chain was born in Berlin in 1906. In his youth, he aspired to become a pianist, but focused on the studies of chemistry and obtained his PH.D. degree at the age of 21. When the Nazi regime came to power, he emigrated to England, at first to Cambridge University and later on to Oxford University. There he joined Howard Florey's department, where he ...