Voyage Through Time: Walks of Life to the Nobel Prize

301 Pages·2003·13.91 MB·English

by  Ahmed H. Zewail

V#YAGE
T-I^*^M THROUGHE
Walks of Life to the Nobel Prize

VOYAGE
Vt-— —-4 ~wO ~ff BY—^ J- "A"^ "-IT- G—r J" E"J —n- ~*n-~ ft II Ha I T —irri ! ^UH^__M«^ un^i^v^
TIME
I t 0 ^'' Walks of Life to the
:
'"^0^ Nobel Prize
K
AHMED ZEWAIL
Linus Pauling Chair Professorship
California Institute of Technology, USA
V | b World Scientific
w l New Jersey London Singapore Hong Kong
Published by
World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
5 Toh Tuck Link, Singapore 596224
USA office: Suite 202,1060 Main Street, River Edge, NJ 07661
UK office: 57 Shelton Street, Covent Garden, London WC2H 9HE
VOYAGE THROUGH TIME
Walks of Life to the Nobel Prize
Copyright © 2002 The American University in Cairo Press
This edition is published by arrangement with
The American University in Cairo Press
All rights reserved.
ISBN 981-238-340-9 (pbk)
Printed in Singapore.
To Egypt
You lit the beacon of civilization
You deserve a brilliant future
May my voyage light a candle of hope for your youth

Contents
List of Illustrations ix
Prologue 1
1 First Steps
On the Banks of the Nile 11
i~\ The Gate to Science
dmd The Alexandria Years 27
*y The American Encounter
f I Independence in Philadelphia 51
4 California Gold
From Berkeley to Pasadena 73
f The Invisible Atom
t J Close-up at Caltech 99
i i - . i i - v i i
6
The Race against Time
Six Millennia to Femtotime 119
7
Time and Matter
The Femtouniverse in Perspective 149
8
On the Road to Stockholm
Festivities and Fairy Tales 167
9
A Personal Vision:
The World of the Have-Nots 199
B
Walks to the Future
My Hope for Egypt and America 213
Epilogue
Success—Is There a Formula? 233
Further Readings 237
Appendix 243
Index 279
viii v o v A <; t; T H IS O U C H T I M F,
Illustrations
Between pages 84 and 85
At the age of twelve
My mother, Rawhia Dar
My father, Hassan Zewail
My father and I on the beach in Alexandria
My sisters Seham and Nana and I in Desuq's club
My mother and I on a visit to the Pyramids in 1988
Uncle Rizq
My letter from President Nasser
Umm Kulthum
Downtown Damanhur, the city of my birth
A vegetable market in Damanhur today
Sidi Ibrahim mosque in Desuq in 1998
My art and painting group at preparatory school
Outside our secondary school in 1961, with several of my friends
1 L I, I! S T RATIONS IX