Once you've wrapped up this podcast, how about trying a very British cult?

What happens if the person you trust with your future isn't what you think they are?

I did feel the whole time he was watching me Yeti. I saw a footprint and that really gave me gusmas.

Or people who knew me. Emme, I remember every secret, every lie. I'm the only one who knows the truth.

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Probably more than most, my guest today would never have imagined becoming a leading academic.

Alf Adams, a cobbler's son and Evacuee War baby, grew up to develop the theoretical principles

behind one of the most ubiquitous electronic devices in the world today, the strained

semiconductor laser. Indeed, without this invention, CD and DVD players and even the

internet itself would arguably never have existed as we know them today. You probably have five

or six electronic appliances in your home right now that have

this device inside them.

Alf was made a fellow of the Royal Society in 1996 and is a recipient of many honours, including most recently the Rank Prize for

Optoelectronics. The applications of his research would today be valued at

many hundreds of millions of pounds and yet when several years ago a newspaper

article listed him as one of the ten Britons who've shaped our world even some of

his own colleagues in the physics department at the University of Surrey where he and I

are based were unaware of the significance of his scientific work.

Alf Adams Distinguished Professor of Physics, welcome to the Life Scientific.

Thank you, Jim, really nice to be here.

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