Passed over for a Nobel

Ralph Alpher, a physicist whose pioneering work on theunderpinnings of the "Big Bang" theory went unheralded for yearswhile others won a Nobel Prize, has died. He was 86.

Mr. Alpher died Aug. 12 in Austin, Texas. He had been honored byPresident Bush with a National Medal of Science in July but wasunable to attend the ceremony because of his failing health, UnionCollege in Schenectady said in announcing his death. He had been onthe Union faculty.

The "Big Bang" theory holds that the universe began billions ofyears ago in the explosion of a single, super-dense point thatcontained all matter.

As a doctoral candidate at George Washington University, …