"Of all the equations of physics, perhaps the most magical is the Dirac equation." Remarked MIT physics professor Frank Wilczek.
Paul Dirac believed that the fundamental laws governing the universe could be expressed through "pretty mathematics".
When he wrote down an equation to describe the electront, he noticed something odd. His equation predicted the existence of antimatter - the mirror image of matter.
If matter is like the salt flats of the Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia, antimatter emerges as its reflection, revealing the mysterious symmetry of the universe.
Dirac predicted the existence of the antimatter counterpart to the electron, the positron.
Subatomic particles with the same mass as electrons that carry a positive electric charge in contrast to the electron's negative charge.
If the two come into contact, they annihilate each other, converting both particles into energy.
For a man best described as an agnostic, he remarked, "God is a mathematician of a very high order." Dirac was a lonely man who grew up a lonely boy and this had a profound impact on his personality and possibly also his work as a theoretical physicist.
He told a colleague, "I never knew love or affection when I was a child," as described in the book "The Strangest Man" by Graham Farmelo.
Paul Dirac's father, Charles, insisted his three children speak to him in his native French.
