Biochemist William Boyd was a close friend of Robert Oppenheimer, the creator of the atomic bomb. In his spare time, Boyd dabbled in writing science fiction under the pen name Boyd Ellanby, and though his literary output was not large, some of his short stories proved to be remarkably influential. Category Phoenix is set in a future in which scientific experimentation has run amok, and researchers are forced to grapple with the question of how much knowledge they should pursue.