Papers published by World War II codebreaker Alan Turing are expected to fetch about �500,000 at auction later.
The Manchester University scientist, who killed himself in 1954, created a machine at Bletchley Park to crack messages in the German Enigma code.
Last year, the then prime minister Gordon Brown gave him a posthumous apology for the "appalling" treatment he received for being gay.
The documents will go under the hammer at Christie's in London later.
Turing, who has been called the "father of the computer", published only 18 papers in his short career.
He was prosecuted for having a sexual relationship with a man and two years later he committed suicide by biting into an apple which he had laced with cyanide.
He was found dead at his home in Wilmslow, Cheshire, where a plaque has been erected to pay tribute to him.
Since it was announced that the papers were going to be sold, IT journalist Gareth Halfacree has been trying to raise the cash to buy them and donate them to Bletchley Park Trust in Milton Keynes.
So far he has raised �85,000 having just received a �62,784 donation from Google.
"We are still a bit short of what we need but I still hope that Microsoft or Apple might donate at the last minute," Mr Halfacree said.
Bids for the collection, which contain his first published paper, his pioneering work on artificial intelligence and the very foundations of the digital computer, have to be submitted by 1030 GMT.
They will go under the hammer at 1400 GMT.
Mr Halfacree added: "If we do not raise enough, which is looking increasingly unlikely, I hope whoever buys it donates the papers to Bletchley Park so we can all benefit from them."
He said the money he has raised so far will still go to the trust whether it is used to buy the papers or not.
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