Cambridge Physics - The Cavendish Laboratory

1. Seventeenth Century Physics
2. Physics and Industry
3. Planning a Laboratory
4. Professor and Laboratory
5. Design of the Cavendish
6. Teaching and Research
7. Expanding the Cavendish
8. A World-Class Laboratory
9. The Rayleigh Wing
10. Cambridge and Manchester
11. Rutherford's Laboratory
12. The Mond Laboratory
13. The Austin Wing
14. Research Groups
15. A Laboratory Among Many
16. The Move to West Cambridge

For the last 130 years, the Cavendish Laboratory has been the heart of physics research in Cambridge. The Cavendish was built in 1873 as a teaching laboratory for Cambridge University, and so far 28 Cavendish researchers have won Nobel prizes for work they carried out in the Laboratory.

Cambridge established its reputation for Physics in the 1600s, but didn't require a dedicated teaching laboratory for another two hundred years. The Cavendish was extended several times throughout the early 1900s until 1974 when it relocated to a new site in West Cambridge.

Trace the development of England's most famous physics laboratory by clicking the link below, or jump straight to a section using the index on the left.