British physicist, b. 1877, d. 1944. Barkla entered the University College, Liverpool, in 1894. He obtained his bachelor's degree in 1898 and his master's in 1899. After this, he began research at the Cavendish Laboratory at Trinity College, Cambridge, under J. J. Thompson. He then moved to King's College, and then returned to Liverpool. Subsequently, he worked at the University of London, and the University of Edinburgh, where he worked until his death.
Barkla's early research focussed on the velocity of electric waves along wires, but he quickly became interested in Röntgen radiation, which he studied for the rest of his career. He discovered the characteristic x-ray spectra of the elements and the polarization of x-rays.
Barkla was awarded the 1917 Nobel Prize in physics
"for his discovery of the characteristic Röntgen
radiation of the elements"
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Researched on www.nobel.se