The ideas, experiments, and inventions of great scientists have revolutionizedour understanding of the world around us. Theories, discoveries,and technologies—from relativity, the genetic code, and the periodictable to synthetic drugs, nuclear weapons, and brain scans—have transformedthe physical world and our lives.Copernicus, Crick, Watson, Galileo, Marie Curie: these are some ofthe forty pioneers behind modern science whose stories are exploredhere. The scientists come from around the globe and represent multiplenationalities—American, English, German, French, Dutch, Czech,Indian, Japanese, and more. Often unorthodox thinkers, they frequentlyhad to struggle against hostile contemporaries to gain recognition fortheir ideas and discoveries.All the major scientific disciplines are covered, including astronomy,biology, biochemistry, chemistry, computing, ecology, geology, medicine,neurology, physics, and psychology, as well as mathematics.