'The most magical equation in physics': How Paul Dirac accidentally revealed the strange world of antimatter

On a navy blue background is the book cover of 'The One Thing You Need to Know: 21 Key Scientific Concepts of the 21st Century' by Marcus Chown. It's a navy blue cover, with a yellow swirly ring in the middle. There are numbers in yellow and green dotted around the background. Text in white at the top is the author's name, Marcus Chown. The capital white text inside the ring is the title which reads 'The one thing you need to know.' At the bottom in a mix of yellow and white text it reads 'The simple way to understand the most important ideas in science.'

British theoretical physicist Paul Dirac was one of the most significant figures in the early days of quantum physics, who along with Erwin Schrödinger won the Nobel Prize for physics in 1933. But it was in 1927 that this quiet, but brilliant mind set to work looking for "pretty mathematics," and in doing so formulated what would become one of his greatest achievements — the Dirac equation.

In this extract from the Antimatter chapter of his book "'The One Thing You Need to Know'," author Marcus Chown explains how Dirac's unusual methods and mannerisms helped guide us towards understanding the fundamental physics that forms the world around us.