Sir Joseph John Thomson
Sir Joseph John Thomson, (1856-1940). British physicist. Thomson won a scholarship to Cambridge in 1876 and was associated with the university for the rest of his life; he became Cavendish professor of experimental physics (1884-1918) and later, master of Trinity College (1918). His discovery of the electron (1897) revolutionized the theory of atomic structure. In 1906 he received the Nobel Prize for physics for his re-searches into the conduction of electricity through gases exposed to X-rays. Thomson was also an outstanding teacher; seven of the men who worked under him were later awarded Nobel Prizes.
