Dr John Cromwell Mather (born 1945), American astrophysicist, cosmologist and Nobel laureate, talking at a press conference about the work for which he was awarded a share of the 2006 Nobel Prize in Physics. The graph in the background presents data from the COBE (Cosmic Background Explorer) probe, which was launched in 1989. This probe measured the cosmic background radiation, a microwave radiation that permeates the entire universe, and is one of the strongest pieces of evidence for the Big Bang theory of the origin of the universe. Mather's COBE work helped show the black body nature of the radiation (as shown by the graph). Photographed at NASA Headquarters, Washington DC, USA, on 3 October 2006.