John Cockcroft

John Douglas Cockcroft was a British physicist and nuclear physicist who worked as a university teacher. He was educated at St John's College, University of Cambridge, the Victoria University of Manchester, and the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology. His doctoral advisor was Ernest Rutherford. Cockcroft participated in World War I as a member of the Royal Artillery and the British Army. He also took part in the Manhattan Project.

He was employed by the Atomic Energy Research Establishment, the Ministry of Supply, the Montreal Laboratory, and Chalk River Laboratories. Cockcroft was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Physics and the Medal of Freedom. He received the Atoms for Peace Award and the Knight of the Legion of Honour. He was a Commander of the Order of the British Empire and a Fellow of the Royal Society. He was a member of the Royal Society, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Cockcroft was born in Todmorden in 1897 and died at Churchill College in 1967. He wrote five works, including *Melanesia*, *The Organization of Research Establishments*, and *Die Friedliche Anwendung der Atomenergie*. He spoke English. His Erdős number was 6.