Tom Lean, interviewer for Made in Britain, writes:
The Oral History of British Science team were saddened to learn of the death last week of interviewee Sir Alan Cottrell. Sir Alan was born in Birmingham in 1919 and studied at the University there. A centrally important figure in the modern history of metallurgy, he spent the second Second World War improving the hardening of tank armour, before moving postwar to atomic research establishment at Harwell, where he worked ensuring the safety of the Magnox nuclear reactors. As Goldsmiths Professor of Metallurgy at the University of Cambridge he became a champion of new approaches to metallurgy and understanding how materials behave on an atomic level. In 1965 he left academic life to serve in a succession of senior posts in the scientific civil service, and succeeded Sir Solly Zuckerman as Chief Scientific Adviser in 1971.
In the following clip from his interview, recorded last year, Sir Alan reflected on the long term influence that being a scientist in wartime had on him.
Sir Alan Cottrell - being a scientist during WW2
The interview with Sir Alan can be accessed online via British Library Sounds.
