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Home , Aage Bohr, Adolf Butenandt, Albrecht Kossel, Alexis Carrel, Allvar Gullstrand, Charles Richet

NOBEL LAUREATES WITH THEIR CONTRIBUTION IN BIOMEDICAL ENGINEERING

Nobel Prizes and Biomedical Engineering

In the year 1901 Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen received in recognition of the extraordinary services he has rendered by the discovery of the remarkable rays subsequently named after him. Röntgen is considered the father of diagnostic radiology, the medical specialty which uses imaging to diagnose disease. He was the first to observe and record X-rays, first finding them on , 1895. was the first medical imaging technology. He had been fiddling with a set of cathode ray instruments and was surprised to find a flickering image cast by his instruments separated from them by some W. C. Röntgenn distance. He knew that the image he saw was not being cast by the cathode rays (now known as beams of ) as they could not penetrate air for any significant distance. After some considerable investigation, he named the new rays "X" to indicate they were unknown.

In the year 1903 Niels Ryberg Finsen received Nobel Prize in recognition of his contribution to the treatment of diseases, especially lupus vulgaris, with concentrated , whereby he has opened a new avenue for medical . In beautiful but simple experiments Finsen demonstrated that the most refractive rays (he suggested as the “chemical rays”) from the sun or from an electric arc may have a stimulating effect on the tissues. If the irradiation is too strong, however, it may give rise to tissue damage, but this may to some extent be prevented by pigmentation of the skin as in the negro or in those much exposed to

Niels Ryberg Finsen the sun. In small-pox Finsen thought that the multiple scars might be avoided if the patient was protected from the chemical rays. The experiments with such patients were successful. On the other hand chemical rays free from heat rays might be used to obtain a useful effect either by concentration on particular area - and this led to the treatment of lupus vulgaris or other skin diseases - or employed as general sun-baths, which on Finsen's suggestion was tried in cases of and the results were promising.

In the year 1911 received Nobel Prize for his work on the dioptrics of the eye. He researched the way the eye refracts light, and invented the slit lamp for eye exams: a device still used by ophthalmologists. His reflex-free ophthalmoscope (1911) is also a valuable instrument to the ophthalmological diagnostician. He detailed the structure of the cornea and improved corrective lenses for people who had undergone cataract surgery. He is noted for his research on astigmatism and for improving the ophthalmoscope and corrective lenses for use after removal of a Allvar Gullstrand cataract from the eye.

In the year 1912, received Nobel Prize in recognition of his work on vascular suture and the transplantation of blood-vessels and organs.

Carrel's researches were mainly concerned with experimental surgery and the transplantation of tissues and whole organs. As early as 1902 he published, in the

Alexis Carrel Lyons Medical, a technique for the end-to-end anastomosis of blood vessels and in 1910 he demonstrated that blood-vessels could be kept for long periods in storage before they were used as transplants in surgery. Earlier, in 1908, he had devised methods for the transplantation of whole organs and later, in 1935, in collaboration with , the airman who was the first to flow across the Atlantic, he devised a machine for supplying a sterile respiratory system to organs removed from the body, Lindbergh having solved the mechanical problems involved. He discussed this aspect of his work and its implications in his book The Culture of Organs. Carrel also published the well-known book entitled Man, the Unknown and, in collaboration with Georges Debelly, a book on Treatment of Infected Wounds. In collaboration with the French Theodore Tuffier, who was a pioneer of thoracic surgery, Carrel performed on the heart a successful series of valvotomies, and in collaboration with Burrows he grew sarcoma cells in tissue cultures by the technique of Harrison.

In the year 1922 the Nobel Prize prize was divided equally between Sir Archibald Vivian Hill for his discovery relating to the production of heat in the muscle and Otto Fritz Meyerhof for his discovery of the fixed relationship between the consumption of oxygen and the of lactid acid in the muscle.

Sir Archibald Vivian Hill worked on muscle function, especially the observation and measurement of thermal changes associated with muscle function, which was later extended to similar studies on the mechanism of the passage of nerve impulses. A very sensitive technique was developed and he was eventually able to measure temperature changes of the order of A. V. Hill Otto Fritz Meyerhof ' 0.003°C over periods of only hundredths of a second. He was the discoverer of the phenomenon that heat was produced as a result of the passage of nerve impulses. His researches gave rise to an enthusiastic following in the field of , a subject whose growth owes much to him.

Otto Fritz Meyerhof's own account of his earlier work states that he was occupied chiefly with oxidation mechanisms in cells and with extending methods of gas analysis through the calorimetric measurement of heat production. In this manner he studied the metabolism of sea-urchin eggs, blood corpuscles, and various and especially the respiratory processes of nitrifying bacteria. He also studied the effects of narcotics and methylene blue on oxidation processes, and the respiration of killed cells. The physico-chemical analogy between oxygen respiration and alcoholic caused him to study both these processes in the same subject, namely, yeast extract. By this work he discovered a co- of respiration, which could be found in all the cells and tissues up till then investigated. At the same time he also found a co-enzyme of alcoholic fermentation. He also discovered the capacity of the SH-group to transfer oxygen; after Hopkins had isolated from cells the SH bodies concerned, Meyerhof showed that the unsaturated fatty acids in the are oxidized with the help of the sulphydryl group. After studying closer the respiration of muscle, Meyerhof investigated the changes in muscle.

Of Meyerhof's many achievements, perhaps the most important is his proof that, in isolated but otherwise intact frog muscle, the formed is reconverted to carbohydrate in the presence of oxygen, and his preparation of a KC1 extract of muscle which could carry out all the steps of with added glycogen and hexose-diphosphate in the presence of derived from yeast. In this system was also glycolysed and this was the foundation of the Embden-Meyerhof theory of glycolysis. For his discovery of the fixed relationship between the consumption of oxygen and the metabolism of lactic acid in the muscle, Meyerhof was awarded, together with the English physiologist A.V. Hill, the Nobel Prize for or for 1922.

The discovery of Otto Meyerhof and his students that some phosphorylated compounds are rich in energy led to a revolution, not only of our concepts of muscular contraction, but of the entire significance of cellular metabolism. A continuously increasing number of enzymatic reactions are becoming known in which the energy of , the compound isolated by his associate Lohmann, provides the energy for endergonic synthesis reactions. The importance of this discovery for the understanding of cellular mechanisms is generally recognized and can hardly be overestimated.

In 1925 Meyerhof succeeded in extracting the glycolytic enzyme system from muscle, retracing a pathway which Buchner and Harden and Young had explored in yeast. This proved to be a decisive step for the analysis of glycolysis. Meyerhof and his associates were able to reconstruct in vitro the main steps of the complicated chain of reactions leading from glycogen to lactic acid. They verified some, and extended other, parts of the scheme proposed by in 1932, shortly before his death.

In the year 1924 received Nobel Prize for his discovery of the mechanism of the electrocardiogram. Willem Einthoven decided to carry out a thorough analysis of A.D. Waller's electrocardiogram - a study which has remained classic in its field. This investigation led Einthoven to intensify his research. To avoid complex mathematical corrections, he finally devised the string which did not involve these calculations. Although the principle in itself was obvious, and practical applications of it were made in other fields of study, the instrument had Willem Einthoven to be precisioned and refined to make it usable for physiologists, and this took three years of laborious work. As a result of this, a galvanometer was produced which could be used in medical science as well as in technology; an instrument which was incomparable in its adaptability and speed of adjustment. His machine, first called an Einthoven galvanometer, had a thin metallic wire held between two , with the wire connected to electrodes on the patient's chest, and the patient's hands and one foot bathed in salt-water tubs. An electromagnetic field made the wire quiver ever-so-slightly as the heart contracted and relaxed, and using photographic film and shining light on the wire, Einthoven's machine could accurately measure and record the strength and rate of a patient's heartbeat. The machine weighed about 600 pounds, and operating it required a team of five technicians. Present day electrocardiographs are much smaller and more accurate, but the underlying principles remain fundamentally the same. He then, with P. Battaerd, took up the study of the heart sounds, followed by research into the currents with W.A. Jolly (begun earlier with H. K. de Haas). The electrocardiogram itself he studied in all its aspects with numerous pupils and with visiting . It was this last research which earned him the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for 1924. In addition to this the string galvanometer has proved of the highest value for the study of the periphery and sympathetic nerves. In the remaining years of his life, problems of and capacity studies came within the sphere of his interests. The construction of the string phonograph (1923) could be considered as a consequence of this. Einthoven possessed the gift of being able to devote himself entirely to a particular field of study. (His was actually more orientated towards than physiology.) As a result he was able to make penetrating inquiries into almost any subject which came within the scope of his interests, and to carry out his work to its logical conclusion.

In the year 1946, for the discovery of the production of by means of X-ray irradiation.

In late 1926 he obtained critical evidence of the abundant production of gene mutations and chromosome changes by X-rays (published 1927). This opened the door to numerous researches, many of them carried on with the aid of students and co-workers, both at his own and other institutions, in the twenty years that followed. These have been briefly outlined in his Nobel Lecture, since they, together with the first discovery of the effect, constitute the work for which the H. J.Muller Nobel Award was granted. They include studies on the mechanisms of the gene effects and of the structural changes, on the roles which each kind of changes, when spontaneously occurring, play in evolution, and on the properties of genes and of chromosome parts (e.g. eu- versus hetero-), as disclosed by studies in which the chromosomes were broken and rearranged.

In the year 1949, the prize was divided equally, one half awarded to for his discovery of the functional organization of the interbrain as a coordinator of the activities of the internal organs and the other half to Antonio Caetano De Abreu Freire Egas Moniz for his discovery of the therapeutic value of leucotomy in certain psychoses.

The scientific interests of Professor Walter Rudolf Hess were primarily directed towards haemodynamics and, in connection with this, the regulation of respiration. While the experimental work on the subject of the central coordination of vegetative organs has in general been extended, a comprehensive picture has emerged of the representation of the vegetative in the diencephalon, which has been accorded distinction by the Nobel Prize. Walter Rudolf Hess

During the experimental investigations of the diencephalon, setting aside the evidence of the regulatory representations, which control the activity of the internal organs in a coordinated fashion, somatomotor effects were observed relatively often. Following this, the symptoms were analysed in more detail, and in the process a relationship was demonstrated between supporting functions, automatic correcting movements, and the differentiated maintenance of tone in the skeletal musculature, as also were connections with actions due to the vestibular apparatus. Other investigations dealt with the control of parts of the forebrain (area orbitalis), in which Hess together with K. Akert has achieved some insight into the cortical representation of sight, and oral and pharyngeal regions.

ANTONIO CAETANO DE ABREU FREIRE EGAS MONIZ, in his exclusive experiments, realized that certain psychoses, particularly degenerated schizophrenia and severe paranoia, involve recurrent thought patterns that dominate normal psychological processes. He reasoned that, severing the nerve fibres between the frontal lobes, known to be closely associated with E. MONIZ psychological responses, and the thalamus, might force a transformation of existing thought patterns to more normal ones, allowing a more normal life for the psychotic.

Prefrontal leucotomy - - was first performed in Lissabon by Egas Moniz and his surgical associate, Almeida Lima, on November 12, 1935. Using local anesthetics Egas Moniz and Almeida Lima drilled several holes in the patient's skull, first injecting adrenalin and novocain, then pure alcohol. The object had been, not to destroy the actual frontal lobes, but rather to destroy the fibers, the white matter, or leukos, which connect the frontal lobes – the area they believed to be most immediately concerned with social behaviour. Their patient was a female asylum inmate. This operation is the first example of the use of brain surgery for the treatment of a psychological disorder.

When the patient awaked she was less agitated and paranoid than she had been before, and she certainly had no worries about her hair. Two months later the patient was observed by a young physician who did not find any of the old symptoms present. Egas had invented the prefrontal lobotomy.

In the year 1956, the Nobel Prize was awarded jointly to André Frédéric Cournand , and Dickinson W. Richards for their discoveries concerning heart catherization and pathological changes in the . French-American physician and physiologist André F. Cournand studied circulation of the blood, and advanced understanding and treatment for heart disease. One aspect of these studies was to improve on blood gas measurements, A. F. Cournand Werner Forssman Dickinson W. Richard n sn particularly of CO2, because this was needed for the estimation of cardiac output. The so-called indirect Fick method then in use calculated cardiac output (or total blood flow) as the ratio of CO2 output from the lung to the CO2 concentration difference between the blood entering and leaving the lung. Whereas CO2 concentration in arterial blood was easy to measure, CO2 concentration in mixed venous blood had to be estimated indirectly from the

CO2 partial pressure in alveolar air. When Cournand joined Richards in 1932 he became involved with this line of work. His first project was to test and improve a rebreathing method for estimating mixed venous CO2 content and to apply it to some cases of pneumothorax. The results remained only partially satisfactory, which led Cournand and Richards, some eight years later, to develop the method of right heart catheterization in order to obtain direct samples of mixed venous blood as it enters the lung.

In reflecting in his Nobel lecture on the state of their capabilities at that time, Richards concluded: “We were able to describe the ventilatory functions of the lung and . . . to define to some extent the mixing and the diffusional aspects of pulmonary alveolar or alveolar-capillary functions. But we still could not measure blood flow through the lungs and could not, therefore, move into those broader concepts of cardiopulmonary function which now began to be our goal.” The problem still was how to obtain adequate samples of mixed venous blood to reliably apply the Fick principle. In 1936 Cournand and Richards decided that the only way of securing such samples was to introduce a from a peripheral into the right atrium. They knew that this technique had been used in animals since the pioneering work of Claude Bernard in 1846 and that the young German surgeon Werner Forssmann had, in a heroic self-experiment in 1929, introduced a thin ureteral catheter into his own right atrium from an arm vein, but yet the procedure was not considered safe for human application. In order to assess the question of risk, Cournand went to , where a former medical teacher of his, Dr. P. Ameuille, had introduced a catheter from an arm vein toward the right atrium in over 100 cases in view of introducing -opaque contrast medium for visualization of pulmonary vasculature. “I reviewed all the cases and returned to persuaded that cardiac catheterization could be used safely and would meet our needs,” Cournand writes in his autobiography. He then reports that for the next four years, in collaboration with Darling, he carried out experiments in dogs and one chimpanzee and “adapted Bernard’s method” to their problem of obtaining samples of mixed venous blood for estimating O2 and CO2 concentrations. It is said that Cournand and Richards also tried the catheterization technique on human cadavers, but there is no mention of this in the published record. Finally in 1941 Cournand and Hilmert Ranges published a note on “Catheterization of the Right Auricle in Man”, detailing the technique already developed to near perfection and assessing the possible effects of the catheter on blood and heart function; the catheter was left in position fifteen to sixty minutes and no ill effects were found. They obtained mixed venous samples and could report the calculation of cardiac output by the Fick principle in one case. That was a breakthrough. Cournand did not invent cardiac catheterization, as is often said; his first paper on the method starts out as follows: “Forssmann first used catheterization of the right heart on himself” (1941,1). But he perfected the technique for safe and widespread use in humans, even in severely ill patients, and thus brought it to fruition; more importantly still, he pioneered the use of this method by obtaining the first significant measurements of cardiopulmonary function in health and disease. Cardiopulmonary physiology was different after that.

In the year 1961, Georg Von Békésy received Nobel Prize, for his discoveries of the physical mechanism of stimulation within the cochlea.

Békésy developed a method for dissecting the inner ear of human cadavers while leaving the cochlea partly intact. By using strobe photography and silver flakes as a marker, he was able to observe that the basilar membrane moves like a when stimulated by sound. Because of the structure of the cochlea and the basilar membrane, different frequencies of sound cause the maximum amplitudes Georg Von Békésy of the waves to occur at different places on the basilar membrane along the coil of the cochlea. High frequencies cause more vibration at the base of the cochlea while low frequencies create more vibration at the apex. He concluded that his observations showed how different sound wave frequencies are locally dispersed before exciting different nerve fibers that from the cochlea to the brain. He theorized that the placement of each sensory cell (hair cell) along the coil of the cochlea corresponds to a specific frequency of sound (the so-called tonotopy). Békésy later developed a mechanical model of the cochlea, which confirmed the concept of frequency dispersion by the basilar membrane in the mammalian cochlea. But this model could not provide any information as to a possible function of this frequency dispersion in the process of hearing.

In a posthumous 1974 article looking back over progress in the field, he remarked "In time, he came to the conclusion that the dehydrated cats and the application of Fourier analysis to hearing problems became more and more a handicap for research in hearing," referring to the difficulties in getting animal preparations to behave as when alive, and the misleading common interpretations of Fourier analysis in hearing research.

In the year 1979, the Nobel prize was awarded jointly to Alan M. Cormack and Sir Godfrey N. Hounsfield for the development of assisted tomography, commonly known as CAT scanning. In CAT scanning, a large coil of x-ray tubes rotates around the patient's body, taking two-dimensional x-rays image from all angles. A computer integrates these entire x-rays images into a single, three-dimensional image on a screen. The data can be saved on the computer. Digital geometry processing is

Alan M. Cormack G. N. Hounsfield used to generate a three-dimensional image of the inside of an object from a large series of two-dimensional X-ray images taken around a single axis of rotation. These cross-sectional images are used for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes in various medical disciplines.

CT produces a volume of data that can be manipulated, through a process known as "windowing", in order to demonstrate various bodily structures based on their ability to block the X-ray beam. Although historically the images generated were in the axial or transverse plane, perpendicular to the long axis of the body, modern scanners allow this volume of data to be reformatted in various planes or even as volumetric (3D) representations of structures. Although most common in medicine, CT is also used in other fields, such as nondestructive materials testing.

Year Laureate Country Rationale

1901 Wilhelm Conrad "in recognition of the

Röntgen extraordinary services he has rendered by the discovery of the remarkable rays subsequently named after

him" 1903 Niels Ryberg Denmark "[for] his contribution to the

Finsen (Faroe Islands) treatment of diseases, especially lupus vulgaris, with concentrated light radiation, whereby he has opened a new avenue for medical science"

1911 Allvar Gullstrand "for his work on the dioptrics of the eye"

1912 Alexis Carrel "[for] his work on vascular suture and the transplantation of blood vessels and organs"

1922 Archibald Vivian "for his discovery relating to

Hill the production of heat in the muscle"

Otto Fritz Germany "for his discovery of the

Meyerhof fixed relationship between the consumption of oxygen and the metabolism of lactic acid in the muscle"

1924 Willem Einthoven The "for the discovery of the mechanism of the electrocardiogram"

1949 Walter Rudolf Hess "for his discovery of the functional organization of the interbrain as a coordinator of the activities of the internal organs"

António Caetano "for his discovery of the

Egas Moniz therapeutic value of leucotomy (lobotomy) in certain psychoses"

1956 André Frédéric "for their discoveries

Cournand concerning heart catheterization and pathological changes in the circulatory system"

Werner Forssmann Federal Republic

of Germany

Dickinson W. United States

Richards

1961 Georg von Békésy United States "for his discoveries of the physical mechanism of stimulation within the cochlea"

1979 Allan M. Cormack United States "for the development of computer assisted tomography"

Sir Godfrey N. United States Hounsfield

NOBEL PRIZE IN GIVEN TO THE BIOMEDICAL STREAM

The (Swedish: Nobelpriset i kemi) is awarded annually by the Royal Swedish of to scientists in the various fields of chemistry. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the 1895 will of , who died in 1896. These prizes are awarded for outstanding contributions in chemistry, physics, literature, peace, and physiology or medicine. As dictated by Nobel's will, the award is administered by the and awarded by a committee that consists of five members elected by the Royal of Sciences.

The first Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded in 1901 to Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff, of the Netherlands. Each recipient receives a medal, a diploma and a monetary award prize that has varied throughout the years. In 2012, the prize was awarded to and . The award is presented in at an annual ceremony on , the anniversary of Nobel's death.

At least 25 laureates have received the Nobel Prize for contributions in the field of organic chemistry, more than any other field of chemistry. Two winners of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, (1938) and (1939), were not allowed by their government to accept the prize. They would later receive a medal and diploma, but not the money.

Frederick Sanger is the only laureate to win the prize twice, in 1958 and 1980.

Two others also won Nobel Prizes in other subjects: Marie (physics in 1903, chemistry in 1911) and Linus Carl Pauling (chemistry in 1954, peace in 1962).

Four women have won the prize: , Irène Joliot-Curie (1935), (1964), and (2009).As of 2012, the prize has been awarded to 162 individuals. There have been eight years in which the Nobel Prize in Chemistry was not awarded.

S.No Name of the Year Photo Nationality Research Topic Nobel Laureautes 1. Heinrich Otto 1927 Germany for his Wieland investigations of the constitution of the bile acids and related substances"

2. Adolf Otto 1928 Germany his research into Reinhold the constitution Windaus of the sterols and their connection with the "

3. 1930 Germany "for his researches into the constitution of haemin and chlorophyll and especially for his synthesis of haemin"

4. Walter 1937 United for his Norman Kingdom investigations on Haworth carbohydrates and C"

5. 1937 Switzerland for his investigations on carotenoids, flavins and vitamins A and B2" 6. Richard 1938 Germany for his work on Kuhn carotenoids and vitamins

7. Adolf 1939 Germany for his work on Friedrich sex hormones Johann Butenandt 8. James 1946 United States for his discovery Batcheller that can Sumner be crystallized"

9. John Howard 1946 United States for their Northrop preparation of enzymes and in a pure form"

10. Wendell 1946 United States for their Meredith preparation of Stanley enzymes and virus proteins in a pure form"

11. Archer John 1952 United for their Porter Martin Kingdom invention of partition chromatography

12. Richard 1952 United for their Laurence Kingdom invention of Millington partition Synge chromatography"

13. Vincent du 1955 United States biochemically Vigneaud important sulphur compounds, especially for the first synthesis of a polypeptide hormone

14. Lord 1957 United for his work on (Alexander Kingdom nucleotides and R.) Todd nucleotide co- enzymes"

15. Frederick 1958 United for his work on Sanger Kingdom the structure of proteins, especially that of insulin" 16. Max 1962 United for their studies Ferdinand Kingdom of the structures Perutz of globular proteins"

17. John 1962 United for their studies Cowdery Kingdom of the structures Kendrew of globular proteins"

18. 1963 Germany their discoveries in the field of the chemistry and technology of high "

19. 1963 in the field of the chemistry and technology of high polymers"

20. Dorothy 1964 United determinations by Crowfoot Kingdom X-ray techniques Hodgkin of the structures of important biochemical substances

21. Luis F. Leloir 1970 Argentina for his discovery of sugar nucleotides and their role in the biosynthesis of carbohydrates"

22. Christian B. 1972 United States for his work on Anfinsen ribonuclease, especially concerning the connection between the

sequence and the biologically active conformation" 23. Stanford 1972 United States for their Moore contribution to the understanding of the connection between chemical structure and

catalytic activity of the active centre of the ribonuclease 24. William H. 1972 United States for their Stein contribution to the understanding of the connection between chemical structure and catalytic activity of the active centre of the ribonuclease molecule"

25. John-Warcup 1975 for his work on Cornforth the stereochemistry of enzyme- catalyzed reactions 26. 1980 United States for his fundamental studies of the of nucleic acids, with particular regard to recombinant- DNA 27. Walter 1980 United States for their contributions concerning the determination of base sequences in

nucleic acids"

28. Frederick 1980 United for their Sanger Kingdom contributions concerning the determination of base sequences in nucleic acids" 29. 1982 United for his Kingdom development of crystallographic and his structural elucidation of biologically important - complexes 30. Robert Bruce 1984 United States for his Merrifield development of methodology for chemical synthesis on a 31. Sidney- 1989 United States for their Altman discovery of catalytic properties of RNA

32. 1989 United States for their discovery of catalytic properties of RNA

33. Richard R. 1991 Switzerland for his Ernst contributions to the development of the methodology of high resolution nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy 34. Kary B. 1993 United States for contributions Mullis to the developments of methods within DNA-based chemistry [...] for his invention of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method"

35. Dr. Michael 1993 for contributions Smith to the developments of methods within DNA-based chemistry [...] for his fundamental contributions to the establishment of oligonucleotide- based, site- directed mutagenesis and its development for protein studies 36. Paul D. Boyer 1997 United States for their elucidation of the enzymatic mechanism underlying the synthesis of adenosine triphosphate (ATP)" 37. John E. 1997 United for their Walker Kingdom elucidation of the enzymatic mechanism underlying the synthesis of adenosine triphosphate (ATP)"

38. Jens C. Skou 1997 Denmark for the first discovery of an ion-transporting enzyme, Na+, K+ -ATPase".

39. Alan J. 2000 United States for their Heeger discovery and development of conductive polymers 40. Alan G. 2000 United States for their MacDiarmid discovery and development of conductive polymers 41. Hideki 2000 for their Shirakawa discovery and development of conductive polymers 42. John B. Fenn 2002 United States for the development of methods for identification and structure analyses of biological macromolecules [...] for their development of soft desorption ionisation methods for mass spectrometric analyses of biological macromolecules"

43. Koichi 2002 Japan for the Tanaka development of methods for identification and structure analyses of biological

macromolecules for their development of soft desorption ionisation methods for mass spectrometric analyses of biological macromolecules." 44. Kurt 2002 Switzerland for the Wüthrich development of methods for identification and structure analyses of biological macromolecules for his development of

nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy for determining the three- dimensional structure of biological macromolecules in solution 45. 2003 United States for discoveries concerning channels in cell membranes [...] for the discovery of water channels." 46. Roderick 2003 United States for discoveries MacKinnon concerning channels in cell membranes [...] for structural and mechanistic studies of ion channels 47. Aaron 2004 Israel for the discovery Ciechanover of ubiquitin- mediated protein degradation".

48. Avram 2004 Israel for the discovery Hershko of ubiquitin- mediated protein degradation

49. 2004 United States for the discovery of ubiquitin- mediated protein degradation"

50. Roger D. 2006 United States for his studies of Kornberg the molecular basis of eukaryotic transcription. 51. Osamu 2008 Japan for the discovery Shimomura and development of the green fluorescent protein, GFP

52. 2008 United States for the discovery and development of the green fluorescent protein, GFP"

53. Roger Y. Tsien 2008 United States for the discovery and development of the green fluorescent protein, GFP"

54. Venkatraman 2009 United States for studies of the Ramakrishnan structure and function of the ribosome".

56. Ada E. Yonath 2009 Israel for studies of the structure and function of the ribosome 57. Robert 2012 United States for studies of G- Lefkowitz protein-coupled receptors

58. Brian 2012 United States for studies of G- Kobilka protein-coupled receptors

Nobel Prizes in Physiology and Medicine

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine has been awarded 103 times to 201 Nobel Laureates between 1901 and 2012.

Average Age for a Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine

The ages in the graphs below refers to how old the Nobel Laureates were the year they were awarded the Nobel Prize. The average age when awarded is 57 for all the Medicine Laureates between 1901 and 2011. The most frequent age bracket for the Medicine Laureates is 60-64. To date, the youngest Nobel Laureate in Medicine is Frederick G. Banting, who was 32 years old when he was awarded in 1923.

Nobel prize Awrded Woman in Physiology or medicine.

2009, Elizabeth H. Blackburn 2009, Carol W. Greider 2008, Françoise Barré-Sinoussi 2004, Linda B. Buck 1995, Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard 1988, Gertrude B. Elion 1986, Rita Levi-Montalcini 1983, Barbara McClintock 1977, Rosalyn Yalow 1947,

Year Laureate Country Rationale

"for his work on serum therapy, especially its application against

1901 Emil Adolf von Behring Germany diphtheria, by which he has opened a new road in the domain of medical science and thereby

placed in the hands of the physician a victorious weapon against illness and deaths" "for his work on malaria, by which he has shown how it enters the organism and thereby United 1902 Sir has laid the foundation for

Kingdom successful research on this disease and methods of combating it" "[for] his contribution to the treatment of diseases, especially Denmark lupus vulgaris, with concentrated

1903 Niels Ryberg Finsen (Faroe Islands) light radiation, whereby he has opened a new avenue for

medical science" "in recognition of his work on the physiology of digestion,

1904 Ivan Petrovich Pavlov through which knowledge on vital aspects of the subject has been transformed and enlarged"

"for his investigations and

1905 Germany discoveries in relation to tuberculosis"

Camillo Golgi Italy

"in recognition of their work on 1906 the structure of the nervous system"

Santiago Ramón y Cajal Spain

"in recognition of his work on

1907 Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran France the role played by protozoa in causing diseases"

Ilya Ilyich Mechnikov Russia

"in recognition of their work on 1908 immunity"

Paul Ehrlich Germany

"for his work on the physiology,

1909 Switzerland pathology and surgery of the gland"

"in recognition of the contributions to our knowledge

1910 Germany of cell chemistry made through his work on proteins, including the nucleic substances"

"for his work on the dioptrics of

1911 Allvar Gullstrand Sweden the eye"

"[for] his work on vascular

1912 Alexis Carrel France suture and the transplantation of blood vessels and organs"

1913 France "[for] his work on "

"for his work on the physiology

1914 Robert Bárány Austria and pathology of the vestibular apparatus"

1915 1916 Not awarded 1917 1918

"for his discoveries relating to

1919 immunity"

"for his discovery of the

1920 Schack August Steenberg Krogh Denmark capillary motor regulating mechanism"

1921 Not awarded

"for his discovery relating to the United

Archibald Vivian Hill production of heat in the Kingdom muscle"

1922 "for his discovery of the fixed relationship between the

Otto Fritz Meyerhof Germany consumption of oxygen and the metabolism of lactic acid in the muscle"

Frederick Grant Banting Canada

1923 "for the discovery of insulin"

John James Rickard Macleod Canada

"for the discovery of the The

1924 Willem Einthoven mechanism of the

Netherlands electrocardiogram"

1925 Not awarded

"for his discovery of the

1926 Johannes Andreas Grib Fibiger Denmark Spiroptera carcinoma"

"for his discovery of the therapeutic value of malaria

1927 Julius Wagner-Jauregg Austria inoculation in the treatment of dementia paralytica"

1928 Charles Jules Henri Nicolle France "for his work on "

The "for his discovery of the

1929 Netherlands antineuritic vitamin"

United "for his discovery of the growth- Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins Kingdom stimulating vitamins"

"for his discovery of human

1930 Austria blood groups"

"for his discovery of the

1931 Germany and mode of action of the respiratory enzyme"

United Sir Charles Scott Sherrington Kingdom

"for their discoveries regarding 1932 the functions of "

United

Edgar Douglas Adrian Kingdom

"for his discoveries concerning

1933 United States the role played by the chromosome in heredity"

"for their discoveries concerning

1934 George Hoyt Whipple United States liver therapy in cases of anaemia"

George Richards Minot United States

William Parry Murphy United States

"for his discovery of the

1935 Germany organizer effect in embryonic development"

United Sir Hallett Dale Kingdom "for their discoveries relating to 1936 chemical transmission of nerve impulses"

Otto Loewi Austria

"for his discoveries in connection with the biological Albert Szent-Györgyi von combustion processes, with

1937 Hungary

Nagyrapolt special reference to and the catalysis of fumaric

acid"

"for the discovery of the role played by the sinus and aortic

1938 Corneille Jean François Heymans Belgium mechanisms in the regulation of respiration"

"for the discovery of the

1939 Germany antibacterial effects of prontosil"

1940 1941 Not awarded 1942

Carl Peter Denmark "for his discovery of "

1943

"for his discovery of the

Edward Adelbert Doisy United States chemical nature of vitamin K"

Joseph Erlanger United States

"for their discoveries relating to 1944 the highly differentiated functions of single nerve fibres"

Herbert Spencer Gasser United States

United Sir Kingdom "for the discovery of 1945 and its curative effect in various infectious diseases" United Sir Ernst Boris Chain Kingdom

Howard Walter Florey Australia

"for the discovery of the

1946 Hermann Joseph Muller United States production of mutations by means of X-ray irradiation"

Carl Ferdinand Cori United States

"for their discovery of the course of the catalytic conversion of glycogen"

1947 Gerty Theresa Cori, née Radnitz United States

"for his discovery of the part played by the hormone of the

Bernardo Alberto Houssay Argentina anterior pituitary lobe in the metabolism of sugar"

"for his discovery of the high efficiency of DDT as a contact

1948 Paul Hermann Müller Switzerland against several "

"for his discovery of the functional organization of the

1949 Walter Rudolf Hess Switzerland interbrain as a coordinator of the activities of the internal organs"

"for his discovery of the

António Caetano Egas Moniz Portugal therapeutic value of leucotomy (lobotomy) in certain psychoses"

Philip Showalter Hench United States

"for their discoveries relating to the hormones of the adrenal

1950 Edward Calvin Kendall United States cortex, their structure and biological effects"

Switzerland

Tadeusz Reichstein

"for his discoveries concerning Union of South

1951 Max Theiler and how to combat

Africa it"

"for his discovery of

1952 Selman Abraham Waksman United States streptomycin, the first effective against tuberculosis"

United "for his discovery of the citric 1953 Sir Hans Adolf Krebs Kingdom acid cycle"

"for his discovery of co-enzyme

Fritz Albert Lipmann United States A and its importance for intermediary metabolism"

John Franklin Enders United States

"for their discovery of the ability of poliomyelitis to grow

1954 Frederick Chapman Robbins United States in cultures of various types of tissue"

Thomas Huckle Weller United States

"for his discoveries concerning

1955 Axel Hugo Theodor Theorell Sweden the nature and mode of action of oxidation enzymes"

André Frédéric Cournand United States "for their discoveries concerning

heart catheterization and 1956 pathological changes in the circulatory system" Federal

Werner Forssmann Republic of

Germany

Dickinson W. Richards United States

"for his discoveries relating to synthetic compounds that inhibit the action of certain body

1957 Italy substances, and especially their action on the vascular system

and the skeletal muscles"

George Wells Beadle United States

"for their discovery that genes act by regulating definite chemical events" 1958 Edward Lawrie Tatum United States

"for his discoveries concerning genetic recombination and the

Joshua Lederberg United States organization of the genetic material of bacteria"

Arthur Kornberg United States "for their discovery of the mechanisms in the biological 1959 synthesis of ribonucleic acid and deoxyribonucleic acid" Spain

Severo Ochoa United States

Sir Frank Australia

"for discovery of acquired 1960 immunological tolerance"

United Sir Peter Brian Medawar Kingdom

"for his discoveries of the

1961 Georg von Békésy United States physical mechanism of stimulation within the cochlea"

United

Francis Harry Compton Crick Kingdom

"for their discoveries concerning the molecular structure of James Dewey Watson United States 1962 nucleic acids and its significance for information transfer in living material"

New Zealand

Maurice Hugh Frederick Wilkins United Kingdom

Sir John Carew Eccles Australia "for their discoveries concerning the ionic mechanisms involved

in excitation and inhibition in 1963 the peripheral and central portions of the nerve cell United Sir Alan Lloyd Hodgkin membrane" Kingdom

United Sir Andrew Fielding Huxley Kingdom

Konrad Bloch United States "for their discoveries concerning the mechanism and regulation of 1964 the and fatty acid metabolism" Federal

Feodor Lynen Republic of Germany

François Jacob France

"for their discoveries concerning

1965 André Lwoff France genetic control of enzyme and virus synthesis"

Jacques Monod France

"for his discovery of tumour-

1966 Peyton Rous United States inducing viruses"

"for his discoveries concerning

Charles Brenton Huggins United States hormonal treatment of prostatic "

Ragnar Granit Finland/Sweden

"for their discoveries concerning the primary physiological and

1967 United States chemical visual processes in the eye"

George Wald United States

Robert W. Holley United States

"for their interpretation of the 1968 genetic code and its function in India protein synthesis"

Marshall W. Nirenberg United States

Max Delbrück United States

"for their discoveries concerning 1969 the replication mechanism and the genetic structure of viruses"

Alfred D. Hershey United States

Salvador E. Luria United States

Julius Axelrod United States "for their discoveries concerning the humoral transmittors in the 1970 nerve terminals and the mechanism for their storage,

Ulf von Euler Sweden release and inactivation" United Sir Kingdom "for his discoveries concerning

1971 Earl W. Sutherland, Jr. United States the mechanisms of the action of

hormones"

Gerald M. Edelman United States "for their discoveries concerning 1972 United the chemical structure of

Rodney R. Porter Kingdom antibodies"

Federal

Karl von Frisch Republic of Germany "for their discoveries concerning organization and elicitation of

1973 individual and social behaviour patterns"

Konrad Lorenz Austria

United

Nikolaas Tinbergen Kingdom

Albert Claude Belgium "for their discoveries concerning

1974 Belgium the structural and functional

organization of the cell" George E. Palade Romania

David Baltimore United States

"for their discoveries concerning the interaction between tumour 1975 viruses and the genetic material Italy

Renato Dulbecco of the cell" United States

Howard Martin Temin United States

"for their discoveries concerning

Baruch S. Blumberg United States new mechanisms for the origin 1976 and dissemination of infectious diseases"

D. Carleton Gajdusek United States

Roger Guillemin United States

"for their discoveries concerning the hormone production Andrew V. Schally United States of the brain" 1977

"for the development of

Rosalyn Yalow United States radioimmunoassays of peptide hormones"

"for the discovery of restriction Switzerland 1978 enzymes and their application to problems of molecular "

Daniel Nathans United States

Hamilton O. Smith United States

Allan M. Cormack United States "for the development of 1979 United Sir Godfrey N. Hounsfield computer assisted tomography" Kingdom

Baruj Benacerraf Venezuela

"for their discoveries concerning genetically determined structures

1980 France on the cell surface that regulate immunological reactions"

George D. Snell United States

"for his discoveries concerning

Roger W. Sperry United States the functional specialization of

the cerebral hemispheres"

David H. Hubel United States

1981 "for their discoveries concerning information processing in the Torsten N. Wiesel Sweden "

Sune K. Bergström Sweden "for their discoveries concerning

1982 prostaglandins and related

Bengt I. Samuelsson Sweden biologically active substances"

United Sir John R. Vane Kingdom "for her discovery of mobile

1983 Barbara McClintock United States genetic elements"

"for theories concerning the

Niels K. Jerne Denmark specificity in development and control of the immune system 1984 and the discovery of the Federal principle for production of

Georges J.F. Köhler Republic of monoclonal antibodies" Germany Argentina

César Milstein United Kingdom

Michael S. Brown United States "for their discoveries concerning 1985 the regulation of cholesterol metabolism"

Joseph L. Goldstein United States

Stanley Cohen United States

"for their discoveries of growth 1986 factors"

Italy

Rita Levi-Montalcini United States

"for his discovery of the genetic

1987 Japan principle for generation of

antibody diversity" United Sir James W. Black Kingdom

"for their discoveries of 1988 important principles for drug

Gertrude B. Elion United States treatment"

George H. Hitchings United States

"for their discovery of the

1989 J. Michael Bishop United States cellular origin of retroviral "

Harold E. Varmus United States

Joseph E. Murray United States "for their discoveries concerning 1990 organ and cell transplantation in

E. Donnall Thomas United States the treatment of human disease" Federal

Erwin Neher Republic of Germany

"for their discoveries concerning 1991 the function of single ion Federal channels in cells"

Bert Sakmann Republic of Germany

Switzerland "for their discoveries concerning

Edmond H. Fischer United States reversible protein 1992 phosphorylation as a biological Edwin G. Krebs United States regulatory mechanism"

United Sir Richard J. Kingdom "for their discoveries of split 1993

genes"

Phillip A. Sharp United States

Alfred G. Gilman United States "for their discovery of G- proteins and the role of these 1994

Martin Rodbell United States proteins in signal transduction in cells"

Edward B. Lewis United States "for their discoveries concerning 1995 Federal the genetic control of early Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard Republic of embryonic development"

Germany Eric F. Wieschaus United States

Peter C. Doherty Australia "for their discoveries concerning 1996 the specificity of the cell Rolf M. Zinkernagel Switzerland mediated immune defence"

"for his discovery of - a

1997 Stanley B. Prusiner United States new biological principle of infection"

Robert F. Furchgott United States

"for their discoveries concerning Louis J. Ignarro United States nitric oxide as a signalling 1998 molecule in the cardiovascular system"

Ferid Murad United States

"for the discovery that proteins have intrinsic signals that govern

1999 Günter Blobel United States their transport and localization in the cell"

Arvid Carlsson Sweden

"for their discoveries concerning

2000 United States signal transduction in the nervous system"

Eric R. Kandel United States

2001 Leland H. Hartwell United States "for their discoveries of key

regulators of the cell cycle" United Sir Kingdom

United Sir Paul M. Nurse Kingdom

United

Sydney Brenner Kingdom

H. Robert Horvitz United States "for their discoveries concerning

'genetic regulation of organ 2002 development and programmed United Sir John E. Sulston cell death'" Kingdom

Paul Lauterbur United States

"for their discoveries concerning 2003 magnetic resonance imaging"

United Sir Kingdom

Richard Axel United States

"for their discoveries of odorant 2004 receptors and the organization of the olfactory system"

Linda B. Buck United States

"for their discovery of the bacterium Helicobacter pylori

2005 Barry J. Marshall Australia and its role in gastritis and "

J. Australia

"for their discovery of RNA Andrew Z. Fire United States 2006 interference - gene silencing by double-stranded RNA"

Craig C. Mello United States

Mario R. Capecchi United States

"for their discoveries of United Sir Martin J. Evans principles for introducing 2007 Kingdom specific gene modifications in mice by the use of embryonic

stem cells."

Oliver Smithies United States

"for his discovery of human

Harald zur Hausen Germany papilloma viruses causing cervical cancer"

2008 Françoise Barré-Sinoussi France

"for their discovery of human

immunodeficiency virus"

Luc Montagnier France

United States

Elizabeth H. Blackburn Australia

"for the discovery of how

Carol W. Greider United States chromosomes are protected by 2009 telomeres and the enzyme

telomerase"

United States

Jack W. Szostak Poland

United "for the development of in vitro 2010 Sir Robert G. Edwards Kingdom fertilization"

Bruce A. Beutler United States

"for their discoveries concerning the activation of innate immunity" 2011 Jules A. Hoffmann France

"for his discovery of the Canada dendritic cell and its role in Ralph M. Steinman United States adaptive immunity" (awarded posthumously)

United Sir John B. Gurdon Kingdom "for the discovery that mature 2012 cells can be reprogrammed to become pluripotent"[

Shinya Yamanaka Japan

All Nobel Prizes in Physics

On 27 November 1895, Alfred Nobel signed his last will and testament, giving the largest share of his fortune to a series of prizes, the Nobel Prizes. As described in Nobel's will, one part was dedicated to “the person who shall have made the most important discovery or invention within the field of physics”. Learn more about the from 1901 to 2012.

The Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded 106 times to 194 Nobel Laureates between 1901 and 2012. is the only Nobel Laureate who has been awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics twice, in 1956 and 1972. This means that a total of 193 individuals have received the Nobel Prize in Physics

Prize Awarder for the Nobel Prize in Physics

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences is responsible for the selection of the Nobel Laureates in Physics. The Academy has 350 Swedish and 164 foreign members. Membership in the Academy constitutes exclusive recognition of successful research achievements. The Academy appoints members of the , the working body, for a three-year term.

Number of Nobel Prizes in Physics

106 Nobel Prizes in Physics have been awarded since 1901. It was not awarded on six occasions: in 1916, 1931, 1934, 1940, 1941, and 1942.

Why were the Nobel Prizes not awarded in those years? In the statutes of the Nobel Foundation it says: "If none of the works under consideration is found to be of the importance indicated in the first paragraph, the prize money shall be reserved until the following year. If, even then, the prize cannot be awarded, the amount shall be added to the Foundation's restricted funds." During and II, fewer Nobel Prizes were awarded.

Number of shared and unshared Nobel Prizes in Physics

47 Physics Prizes have been given to one Laureate only.

30 Physics Prizes have been shared by two Laureates.

29 Physics Prizes have been shared between three Laureates.

Why is that? In the statutes of the Nobel Foundation it says: "A prize amount may be equally divided between two works, each of which is considered to merit a prize. If a work that is being rewarded has been produced by two or three persons, the prize shall be awarded to them jointly. In no case may a prize amount be divided between more than three persons."

Average age

The average age of all Physics Laureates between 1901 and 2011 is 54 years. Youngest Physics Laureate

To date, the youngest Nobel Laureate in Physics is , who was 25 years old when he was awarded the Nobel Prize together with his father in 1915. Bragg is not only the youngest Physics Laureate, he is also the youngest Nobel Laureate in any Nobel Prize category.

Youngest Physics Laureate

To date, the youngest Nobel Laureate in Physics is Lawrence Bragg, who was 25 years old when he was awarded the Nobel Prize together with his father in 1915. Bragg is not only the youngest Physics Laureate; he is also the youngest Nobel Laureate in any Nobel Prize category.

Oldest Physics Laureate

The oldest Nobel Laureate in Physics to date is Raymond Davis Jr., who was 88 years old when he was awarded the Nobel Prize.

Oldest Physics Laureate

The oldest Nobel Laureate in Physics to date is Raymond Davis Jr., who was 88 years old when he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2002.

Female Nobel Laureates in Physics

Of the 193 individuals awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics, only two are women. 1903 - Marie Curie (also awarded the 1911 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.) 1963 - Maria Goeppert-Mayer

Multiple Nobel Laureates in Physics

John Bardeen is the only person who has received the Nobel Prize in Physics twice. Marie Curie was awarded the Nobel Prize twice, once in Physics and once in Chemistry.

John Bardeen - Physics 1956 Physics 1972

Marie Curie - Physics 1903, Chemistry 1911

Family Nobel Laureates in Physics

Married couples:

Marie Curie and were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1903. Marie Curie was awarded the Nobel Prize a second time in 1911, this time receiving the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. (One of Marie and Pierre Curie's daughters, Irène Joliot-Curie , was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1935 together with her husband Frédéric Joliot.) 1937.

Father & son:

(All awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics.)

William Bragg and Lawrence Bragg, 1915

Niels Bohr, 1922 and Aage N. Bohr, 1975

Manne Siegbahn, 1924

and Kai M. Siegbahn, 1981 J. J. Thomson, 1906 and in Literature 1931).

Year Laureate Country Rational

Wilhelm Conrad "in recognition of the extraordinary services he has rendered by the

1901 Germany

Röntgen discovery of the remarkable rays subsequently named after him”

"in recognition of the extraordinary service they rendered by their

1902 Netherlands researches into the influence of upon radiationphenomena"

Pieter Zeeman Netherlands

Antoine Henri

France "[for] his discovery of spontaneous radioactivity"

Becquerel

1903 Pierre Curie France

"[for] their joint researches on the radiation phenomena discovered by Professor Henri "

Poland

Marie Curie France

United "for his investigations of the densities of the most important gases

1904 Lord Rayleigh

Kingdom and for his discovery of argon in connection with these studies"

Philipp Eduard Germany- 1905 Anton von "for his work on cathode rays" Hungary

Lenard

Joseph John United "[for] his theoretical and experimental investigations on 1906

Thomson Kingdom the conduction of by gases"

"for his optical precision instruments and Albert Abraham United 1907 the spectroscopic and metrological investigations carried out with

Michelson States their aid"

Gabriel "for his method of reproducing colours photographically based on the 1908 France

Lippmann phenomenon of interference"

Guglielmo

Italy

Marconi

1909 "[for] their contributions to the development of "

Karl Ferdinand Germany

Braun

Johannes Diderik 1910 Netherlands "for his work on the equation of state for gases and liquids"

van der Waals

"for his discoveries regarding the laws governing the radiation of

1911 Germany heat"

"for his invention of automatic valves designed to be used in

1912 Nils Gustaf Dalén Sweden combination with gas accumulators in lighthouses and buoys"

Heike "for his investigations on the properties of matter at low temperatures 1913 Kamerlingh- Netherlands which led, inter alia, to the production of liquid "

Onnes

"For his discovery of the of X-rays by crystals", an

1914 Germany important step in the development of X-ray spectroscopy.

William Henry United "For their services in the analysis of crystal structure by means of X- 1915

Bragg Kingdom rays" an important step in the development of X-ray

William United

Lawrence Bragg Kingdom

1916 Not awarded

"For his discovery of the characteristic Röntgen radiation of the Charles Glover United 1917 elements" another important step in the development of X-ray

Barkla Kingdom spectroscopy

"[for] the services he rendered to the advancement of physics by his

1918 Germany discovery of energy quanta"

"for his discovery of the Doppler effect in canal rays and the splitting

1919 Germany of spectral lines in electric fields"

Charles Édouard "[for] the service he has rendered to precision measurements in

1920 Switzerland

Guillaume physics by his discovery of anomalies in nickel-steel alloys"

"for his services to , and especially for his

1921 Germany discovery of the law of the "

"for his services in the investigation of the structure of [[]s and

1922 Denmark of the radiation emanating from them"

Robert Andrews United "for his work on the elementary charge of electricity and on 1923

Millikan States the photoelectric effect"

1924 Sweden "for his discoveries and research in the field of X-ray spectroscopy"

James Franck Germany

"for their discovery of the laws governing the impact of 1925 an electron upon an atom"

Gustav Germany

Jean Baptiste "for his work on the discontinuous structure of matter, and especially 1926 France

Perrin for his discovery of sedimentation equilibrium"

Arthur Holly United "for his discovery of the effect named after him"

Compton States

1927

Charles Thomson United "for his method of making the paths of electrically charged particles

Rees Wilson Kingdom visible by condensation of vapour"

Owen Willans United "for his work on the thermionic phenomenon and especially for the 1928

Richardson Kingdom discovery of the law named after him"

Prince Louis- Victor Pierre 1929 France "for his discovery of the wave nature of electrons" Raymond de

Broglie

Chandrasekhara "for his work on the scattering of light and for the discovery of

1930 India [36]

Venkata Raman the effect named after him"

1931 Not awarded

Werner "for the creation of quantum , the application of which has, 1932 Germany

Heisenberg inter alia, led to the discovery of the allotropic forms of "

Erwin

Austria

Schrödinger

1933 "for the discovery of new productive forms of atomic theory"

United

Paul Dirac Kingdom

1934 Not awarded

United

1935 "for the discovery of the " Kingdom

Victor Francis 1936 Austria "for his discovery of cosmic radiation"

Hess

Carl David United "for his discovery of the positron"

Anderson States

Clinton Joseph United

Davisson States

"for their experimental discovery of the diffraction of electrons by 1937 crystals"

George Paget United

Thomson Kingdom

"for his demonstrations of the existence of new radioactive elements

1938 Italy produced by neutron irradiation, and for his related discovery of nuclear reactions brought about by slow "

"for the invention and development of the and for results United

1939 obtained with it, especially with regard to artificial radioactive States elements"

1940 Not awarded

1941 Not awarded 1942 Not awarded

United "for his contribution to the development of the molecular ray method

1943 States and his discovery of the of the "

United "for his resonance method for recording the magnetic properties

1944 States of atomic nuclei”

"for the discovery of the Exclusion Principle, also called the Pauli

1945 Austria principle"

"for the invention of an apparatus to produce extremely high Percy Williams United 1946 pressures, and for the discoveries he made there within the field

Bridgman States of high pressure physics"

"for his investigations of the physics of the upper Edward Victor United 1947 atmosphere especially for the discovery of the so-called Appleton

Appleton Kingdom layer"

"for his development of the Wilson method, and his Patrick Maynard United 1948 discoveries therewith in the fields of and cosmic

Stuart Blackett Kingdom radiation"

"for his prediction of the existence of on the basis of

1949 Japan theoretical work on nuclear forces"

"for his development of the photographic method of studying nuclear Cecil Frank United 1950 processes and his discoveries regarding mesons made with this

Powell Kingdom method"

John Douglas United

Cockcroft Kingdom

"for their pioneer work on the transmutation of atomic nuclei by 1951 artificially accelerated atomic particles"

Ernest Thomas

Ireland

Sinton Walton

United "for their development of new methods for nuclear magnetic

1952 States precision measurements and discoveries in connection therewith"

Edward Mills United

Purcell States

"for his demonstration of the phase contrast method, especially for

1953 Netherlands his invention of the phase contrast "

United "for his fundamental research in , especially for

Max Born Kingdom his statistical interpretation of the wavefunction"

1954

West

Walther Bothe "for the coincidence method and his discoveries made therewith"

Germany

Willis Eugene United "for his discoveries concerning the fine structure of the hydrogen 1955

Lamb States spectrum"

United "for his precision determination of the magnetic moment of

Polykarp Kusch States the electron"

United

John Bardeen States

"for their researches on and their discovery of 1956 Walter Houser United the effect" Brattain States

William Bradford United

Shockley States

Tsung-Dao Lee

"for their penetrating investigation of the so-called parity laws which 1957 has led to important discoveries regarding the elementary particles"

Chen Ning Yang China

Pavel Soviet Alekseyevich

Union

Cherenkov

Soviet

1958 "for the discovery and the interpretation of the Cherenkov effect" Union

Igor Soviet Yevgenyevich Union

Tamm

Owen United

Chamberlain States

1959 "for their discovery of the "

Emilio Gino Italy

Segrè

Donald Arthur United 1960 "for the invention of the bubble chamber"

Glaser States

"for his pioneering studies of in atomic nuclei and United

Robert Hofstadter for his thereby achieved discoveries concerning the structure of States the nucleons"

1961

"for his researches concerning the resonance absorption of gamma Rudolf Ludwig West radiation and his discovery in this connection of the effect which

Mössbauer Germany bears his name"

Lev Davidovich Soviet "for his pioneering theories for condensed matter, especially liquid 1962

Landau Union helium"

Hungary – "for his contributions to the theory of the and the Eugene Paul 1963 United elementary particles, particularly through the discovery and

Wigner States application of fundamental symmetry principles"

Maria Goeppert- United

Mayer States

"for their discoveries concerning nuclear shell structure"

West

J. Hans D. Jensen Germany

Nicolay Soviet Gennadiyevich Union

Basov

"for fundamental work in the field of quantum , which has Alexander Soviet 1964 led to the construction of oscillators and based on

Prokhorov Union themaser- principle"

Charles Hard United

Townes States

Richard Phillips United

Feynman States

United "for their fundamental work in , with deep-

1965 States ploughing consequences for the physics of elementary particles"

Sin-Itiro Japan

Tomonaga

"for the discovery and development of optical methods for studying

1966 France Hertzian resonances in "

Hans Albrecht United "for his contributions to the theory of nuclear reactions, especially his 1967 [68]

Bethe States discoveries concerning the energy production in stars"

"for his decisive contributions to elementary , in Luis Walter United particular the discovery of a large number of resonance states, made 1968

Alvarez States possible through his development of the technique of using hydrogen bubble chamber and data analysis"

Murray Gell- United "for his contributions and discoveries concerning the classification of 1969 [70]

Mann States elementary particles and their interactions"

"for fundamental work and discoveries in magneto- Hannes Olof Sweden hydrodynamics with fruitful applications in different parts of

Gösta Alfvén physics"

1970

"for fundamental work and discoveries

Louis Néel France concerning and ferrimagnetism which have led to important applications insolid state physics"

Hungary –

1971 United "for his invention and development of the holographic method" Kingdom

United "for their jointly developed theory of , usually

1972 John Bardeen States called the BCS-theory"

United

Leon Neil Cooper States

John Robert United

Schrieffer States

Leo Esaki Japan

"for their experimental discoveries regarding tunneling phenomena in semiconductors and superconductors, respectively” United

1973 States

"for his theoretical predictions of the properties of Brian David United a supercurrent through a tunnel barrier, in particular those

Josephson Kingdom phenomena which are generally known as the "

United

Martin Ryle Kingdom "for their pioneering research in radio : Ryle for his observations and inventions, in particular of the aperture 1974 United synthesistechnique, and Hewish for his decisive role in the discovery

Antony Hewish Kingdom of "

"for the discovery of the connection between collective and

1975 Denmark particle motion in atomic nuclei and the development of the theory of the structure of the atomic nucleus based on this connection"

Ben Roy Denmark

Mottelson

Leo James United

Rainwater States

United

Burton Richter States

"for their pioneering work in the discovery of a heavy elementary 1976 particle of a new kind"

Samuel Chao United

Chung Ting States

Philip Warren United

Anderson States

Nevill Francis United "for their fundamental theoretical investigations of the electronic 1977

Mott Kingdom structure of magnetic and disordered systems"

John Hasbrouck United

Van Vleck States

Pyotr Soviet "for his basic inventions and discoveries in the area of low- Leonidovich Union temperature physics"

Kapitsa 1978

Arno Allan United "for their discovery of cosmic background radiation"

Penzias States

Robert Woodrow United

Wilson States

Sheldon Lee United

Glashow States

"for their contributions to the theory of the unified weak and

1979 electromagnetic interaction between elementary particles, including, inter alia, the prediction of the weak neutral current"

United

Steven Weinberg States

James Watson United

Cronin States "for the discovery of violations of fundamental symmetry 1980 principles in the decay of neutral K-mesons"

Val Logsdon United

Fitch States

Nicolaas United

Bloembergen States

"for their contribution to the development of laser spectroscopy"

Arthur Leonard United 1981

Schawlow States

Kai Manne Börje "for his contribution to the development of high-resolution electron Sweden

Siegbahn spectroscopy”

Kenneth G. United "for his theory for critical phenomena in connection with phase 1982

Wilson States transitions" India Subrahmanyan "for his theoretical studies of the physical processes of importance to United [84]

Chandrasekhar the structure and evolution of the stars" States 1983 "for his theoretical and experimental studies of the nuclear William Alfred United reactions of importance in the formation of the chemical elements in

Fowler States the "

Carlo Rubbia Italy "for their decisive contributions to the large project, which led to the 1984 discovery of the field particles W and Z, communicators of weak

interaction" Simon van der Netherlands

Meer

Klaus von West 1985 "for the discovery of the quantized "

Klitzing Germany

West "for his fundamental work in electron , and for the design of the

Ernst Ruska Germany first electron microscope"

West

Gerd Binnig Germany 1986

"for their design of the scanning tunneling microscope"

Heinrich Rohrer Switzerland

Johannes Georg West

Bednorz Germany "for their important break-through in the discovery 1987 of superconductivity in ceramic materials”

Karl Alexander Switzerland

Müller

Leon Max United

Lederman States

United

Melvin Schwartz States "for the beam method and the demonstration of 1988 the doublet structure of the through the discovery of the neutrino" United

Jack Steinberger States

Norman Foster United "for the invention of the separated oscillatory fields method and its

Ramsey States use in the hydrogen and other atomic clocks" Hans Georg United

Dehmelt States 1989 "for the development of the ion trap technique” West

Wolfgang Paul Germany

Jerome I. United

Friedman States

"for their pioneering investigations concerning deep inelastic scattering of electrons on and bound neutrons, which have 1990 Henry Way United been of essential importance for the development of the quark

Kendall States model in particle physics"

Richard E. Taylor Canada

"for discovering that methods developed for studying order Pierre-Gilles de 1991 France phenomena in simple systems can be generalized to more complex

Gennes forms of matter, in particular to liquid crystals and polymers"

"for his invention and development of particle detectors, in particular

1992 France the multiwire proportional chamber"

Russell Alan United "for the discovery of a new type of , a discovery that has 1993

Hulse States opened up new possibilities for the study of gravitation” Joseph Hooton United

Taylor, Jr. States

"for the development of neutron spectroscopy" and "for pioneering Bertram Canada contributions to the development of neutron scattering techniques for

Brockhouse studies of condensed matter" 1994

"for the development of the neutron diffraction technique" and "for Clifford United pioneering contributions to the development of neutron

Glenwood Shull States scatteringtechniques for studies of condensed matter"

Martin Lewis United "for the discovery of the " and "for pioneering experimental

Perl States contributions to lepton physics"

1995

United "for the detection of the neutrino" and "for pioneering experimental

Frederick Reines States contributions to lepton physics"

United

David Morris Lee States

1996 Douglas D. United "for their discovery of in helium-3"

Osheroff States

Robert Coleman United

Richardson States

United

1997 "for development of methods to cool and trap atoms with laser light." States

Claude Cohen- France

Tannoudji

William Daniel United

Phillips States

Robert B. United

Laughlin States

"for their discovery of a new form of quantum fluid with fractionally 1998 charged excitations" Horst Ludwig Germany

Störmer

United

Daniel Chee Tsui States

Gerard 't Hooft Netherlands

"for elucidating the quantum structure of electroweak interactions in 1999 physics"

Martinus J. G. Netherlands

Veltman

Zhores Ivanovich Russia "for developing heterostructures used in high-speed- Alferov and optoelectronics” 2000

Herbert Kroemer Germany

Jack St. Clair United "for his part in the invention of the integrated circuit"

Kilby States United

Eric Allin Cornell States

Carl Edwin United

Wieman States "for the achievement of Bose–Einstein condensation in dilute gases

2001 of alkali atoms, and for early fundamental studies of the properties of the condensates" Wolfgang Germany

Ketterle

Raymond Davis, United

Jr. States "for pioneering contributions to astrophysics, in particular for the detection of cosmic "

Masatoshi 2002 Japan

Koshiba

Riccardo "for pioneering contributions to astrophysics, which have led to the Italy

Giacconi discovery of cosmic X-ray sources"

Alexei Alexeyevich Russia

Abrikosov

"for pioneering contributions to the theory 2003 Vitaly Lazarevich Russia of superconductors and superfluids"

Ginzburg

United Anthony James Kingdom

Leggett United States

United

David J. Gross States

"for the discovery of in the theory of the strong 2004 Hugh David United interaction"

Politzer States

United

Frank Wilczek States

United

Roy J. Glauber "for his contribution to the quantum theory of optical coherence" States

2005 United

John L. Hall States "for their contributions to the development of laser-based precision spectroscopy, including the optical frequency

combtechnique" Theodor W. Germany

Hänsch

United

John C. Mather States

"for their discovery of the blackbody form and anisotropy of 2006 the cosmic microwave background radiation"

United

George F. Smoot States

Albert Fert France

2007 "for the discovery of giant magnetoresistance”

Peter Grünberg Germany

Makoto Japan

Kobayashi "for the discovery of the origin of the broken symmetry which predicts the existence of at least three families of quarks in nature"

Toshihide 2008 Japan

Maskawa

United "for the discovery of the mechanism of spontaneous broken

Yoichiro Nambu States symmetry in subatomic physics"

Hong Kong United "for groundbreaking achievements concerning the transmission of

Charles K. Kao Kingdom light in fibers for " United

States

Canada

2009 Willard S. Boyle United States

"for the invention of an imaging semiconductor circuit – the CCD sensor"

United

George E. Smith States

Russia

Andre Geim Netherlands

"for groundbreaking experiments regarding the two-dimensional 2010 material "

Russia Konstantin United

Novoselov Kingdom

United

Saul Perlmutter States

Australia "for the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the 2011 Brian P. Schmidt United Universe through observations of distant supernovae" States

United

Adam G. Riess States

Serge Haroche France

"for ground-breaking experimental methods that enable measuring 2012 and manipulation of individual quantum systems."

David J. United

Wineland States

2010 Geim Andre/ Novoselov Konstamtin Graphene

Graphene, as a single planar sheet of sp2 -bonded carbon atoms, tightly packed in a honeycomb crystal lattice, theoretically was described already 60 years ago. But only in 2004 a stable 2D sheet of carbon atoms was isolated by using the technique of micromechanical cleavage. Graphene’s unique properties arise from the collective behavior of its charge- carrying fermions. The interaction between fermions and the honeycomb lattice causes electrons effectively to obey the relativistic . As a consequence, these are distributed in a conical spectrum. Both the electrons and holes could be considered as massless particles inside zero band gap graphene. Their states are interconnected, and coexist together at the zero called Dirac point.

Boyle, WillardKao, invention of the CCD sensor, an imaging semiconductor circuit/ 2009 Charles, Smith, George achievements concerning the transmission of light in fibres for

E. optical communication

2009 NOBEL PRIZE IN PHYSICS WAS AWARDED TO Charles K. Kao (Standard , Harlow, UK, and Chinese University of Hong Kong), and Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith (both of whom worked chiefly at Bell Laboratories, in Murray Hill, NJ, USA) for their work leading to modern . Kao will receive half the prize money for helping to invent modern , allowing signals to travel flawlessly thousands of miles. Boyle and Smith will split the other half of the prize for their development of charge coupled devices (CCDs). The part of this year's award associated with Mr. Kao underscores the fact that optical fibers carry an increasing fraction of phone calls, television programs, and traffic into homes. Data can move down fiber more quickly than through copper wire because nothing is faster than light, and light signaling offers higher for electronic circuitry. Encoding information in the form of light pulses rather than as electric pulses allows more data to flow down a line. Kao's principal achievement was in making the fiber more efficient; by excluding impurities in the fiber material, he developed a material that absorbed less of the light carrying signals over long distances. The part of the prize associated with Boyle and Smith recognizes the huge advantage of capturing images in digital rather than film form. Pictures can be sent through wires more easily, can be manipulated and processed in creative ways (e.g., you can see a moving comet or in sky scans by subtracting tonight's pixel map from last night's map), and can be stored more handily. Devices such as photomultiplier tubes for converting light into an electric signal have been around for decades. But the CCD allowed whole two- dimensional fields of optical data to be read out more quickly and efficiently. And, of course, CCD's have been the backbone of the commercial digital camera industry.

2007 Fert, Albert,Grünberg, Peter discovery of giant magnetoresistance

Giant magnetoresistance was discovered in 1988 as part of a collaboration between a team led by (CNRS/Université Paris-Sud 11) and Thales (then Thomson-CSF). The discovery led to the emergence of a new kind of electronics, called spintronics, which, like GMR, makes use of the influence of electron spin on electrical conduction. Albert Fert and the CNRS/Thales Joint Physics Unit have made a significant contribution to the development of spintronics, especially in the field of so-called spin transfer phenomena, which will have major applications such as the switching of magnetic memory devices and the construction of radiofrequency/hyperfrequency oscillators for professional electronics. Spintronics is today a booming nanoscience. The trend is toward hybrid systems that associate magnetic materials with semiconductors or , which promises numerous applications in the fields of information technology and telecommunications.

Glauber,

Roy J., contributions to the field of optics/ contributions to the development of

Hall laser spectroscopy 2005 John L.

The Nobel Prize is being awarded to Professor Hänsch in recognition for work that he did at the end of the 1990s at the Max Planck Institute in Garching, near , Germany. He developed an optical " synthesiser", which makes it possible, for the first time, to measure with extreme precision the number of light oscillations per second. These optical frequency measurements can be millions of times more precise than previous spectroscopic determinations of the wavelength of light. The work in Garching was motivated by experiments on the very precise laser spectroscopy of the hydrogen atom. This atom has a particularly simple structure. By precisely determining its spectral line, scientists were able to draw conclusions about how valid our fundamental physical constants are - if, for example, they change slowly with time. By the end of the 1980s, the laser spectroscopy of hydrogen had reached the maximum precision allowed by interferometric measurements of optical wavelengths.

Abrikosov, Alexei A. , discoveries regarding superconductivity and superfluidity at very low 2003 Ginzburg, temperatures Vitaly L.

This year's Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded to three who have made decisive contributions concerning two phenomena in quantum physics: superconductivity and superfluidity. Superconducting material is used, for example, in magnetic resonance imaging for medical examinations and particle accelerators in physics. Knowledge about superfluid liquids can give us deeper insight into the ways in which matter behaves in its lowest and most ordered state. At low temperatures (a few degrees above ) certain metals allow an electric current to pass without resistance. Such superconducting materials also have the property of being able to displace magnetic flows completely or partly. Those that displace magnetic flows completely are called type-I superconductors and a theory explaining them was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1972. This theory, which is based on the fact that pairs of electrons are formed, proved, however, to be inadequate for explaining superconductivity in the technically most important materials. These type-II superconductors allow superconductivity and magnetism to exist at the same time and remain superconductive in high magnetic fields.Alexei Abrikosov succeeded in explaining this phenomenon theoretically. His starting point was a theory that had been formulated for type-I superconductors by and others, but which proved to be so comprehensive that it was also valid for the new type. Although these theories were formulated in the 1950s, they have gained renewed importance in the rapid development of materials with completely new properties. Materials can now be made superconductive at increasingly high temperatures and strong magnetic fields. Liquid helium can become superfluid, that is, its vanishes at low temperatures. Atoms of the rare 3He have to form pairs analogous with pairs of electrons in metallic superconductors. The decisive theory explaining how the atoms interact and are ordered in the superfluid state was formulated in the 1970s by Anthony Leggett. Recent studies show how this order passes into chaos or turbulence, which is one of the unsolved problems of . achievement of Bose-Einstein condensation in dilute gases of Cornell, Eric A., 2001 Ketterle, Wolfgang alkali atoms; early fundamental studies of the properties of the condensates

In 1924 the Indian Bose made important theoretical calculations regarding light particles. He sent his results to Einstein who extended the theory to a certain type of atom. Einstein predicted that if a gas of such atoms were cooled to a very low temperature all the atoms would suddenly gather in the lowest possible energy state. The process is similar to when drops of liquid form from a gas, hence the term condensation. Seventy years were to pass before this year's Nobel Laureates, in 1995, succeeded in achieving this extreme . Cornell and Wieman then produced a pure condensate of about 2 000 atoms at 20 nK (nanokelvin), i.e. 0.000 000 02 degrees above absolute zero. Independently of the work of Cornell and Wieman, Ketterle performed corresponding experiments with atoms. The condensates he managed to produce contained more atoms and could therefore be used to investigate the phenomenon further. Using two separate BECs which were allowed to expand into one another, he obtained very clear interference patterns, i.e. the type of pattern that forms on the surface of water when two stones are thrown in at the same time. This experiment showed that the condensate contained entirely co-ordinated atoms. Ketterle also produced a stream of small "BEC drops" which fell under the force of gravity. This can be considered as a primitive "laser beam" using matter instead of light. It is interesting to speculate on areas for the application of BEC. The new "control" of matter which this technology involves is going to bring revolutionary applications in such fields as precision measurement and .

Alferov,

Zhores I. development of fast semiconductors for use in microelectronics/

2000 Kilby, Jack S. development of the integrated circuit (microchip) Kroemer,

Herbert

In today's society increasing amounts of information flow from our out through the optical fibres of the Internet and through our mobile to satellite radio links all over the world. Two simple but fundamental requirements are put on a modern information system for it to be practically useful. It must be fast, so that large volumes of information can be transferred in a short time. The user's apparatus must be small so that there is room for it in offices, homes, briefcases or pockets. Through their inventions this year's Nobel Laureates in physics have laid a stable foundation for modern information technology. Zhores I. Alferov and have invented and developed fast opto- and microelectronic components based on layered semiconductor structures, termed semiconductor heterostructures. Fast built using heterostructure technology are used in e.g. radio link satellites and the base stations of mobile telephones. Laser built with the same technology drive the flow of information in the Internet's fibre-optical cables. They are also found in CD players, bar-code readers and laser pointers. With heterostructure technology powerful light-emitting diodes are being built for use in car brake-, traffic lights and other warning lights. Electric bulbs may in the future be replaced by light-emitting diodes. Jack S. Kilby is being rewarded for his part in the invention and development of the integrated circuit, the chip. Through this invention microelectronics has grown to become the basis of all modern technology. Examples are powerful computers and processors which collect and process data and control everything from washing machines and cars to space probes and medical diagnostic equipment such as computer tomographs and magnetic resonance cameras. The microchip has also led to our environment being flooded with small electronic apparatuses, anything from electronic watches and TV games to mini-calculators and personal computers.

Klitzing, Klaus von (QH), 1879, 1985 Laughlin, Robert B., Störmer, Horst discovery of the Hall/ Quantum and , 1998 L., Tsui, Daniel C. (FQH) fractional

As a young student in 1879 Edwin H. Hall discovered an unexpected phenomenon. He found that if a thin gold plate is placed in a at right angles to its surface an electric current flowing along the plate can cause a potential drop at right angles both to the current and the magnetic field (see figure 1).

Figure 1

Termed the Hall effect, this takes place because electrically charged particles (in this case electrons) moving in a magnetic field are influenced by a force and deflect laterally. The Hall effect can be used to determine the density of charge carriers (negative electrons or positive holes) in conductors and semi-conductors, and has become a standard tool in physics laboratories the world over. In 1980 the German physicist discovered in a similar experiment that the Hall resistance does not vary in linear fashion, but "stepwise" with the strength of the magnetic field (see figure 2). The steps occur at resistance values that do not depend on the properties of the material but are given by a combination of fundamental physical constants divided by an integer. We say that the resistance is quantized. At quantized Hall resistance values, normal Ohmic resistance disappears and the material becomes in a sense superconducting. For his discovery of what is termed the integer quantum Hall effect von Klitzing received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1985.

Figure 2

The effect may be understood if one accepts the laws of quantum physics for how individual electrons behave in powerful magnetic fields. In simple terms, the electrons move only in certain circular paths, the basic sizes of which are determined by the magnetic field. The various steps turn out to show how many of the smallest paths are entirely full of electrons. In their refined experimental studies of the quantum Hall effect, using among other things lower temperatures and more powerful magnetic fields, Störmer, Tsui and their co-workers found to their great surprise a new step in the Hall resistance which was three times higher than von Klitzing's highest. They subsequently found more and more new steps, both above and between the integers. All the new step heights can be expressed with the same constant as earlier but now divided by different fractions. For this reason the new discovery was named the fractional quantum Hall effect. It posed a great mystery for the researchers who could not explain how the new steps came about. A year after the discovery of the fractional quantum Hall effect, Laughlin offered a theoretical explanation. According to his theory the low temperature and the powerful magnetic field compel the electron gas to condense to form a new type of quantum fluid. Since electrons are most reluctant to condense (they are what is termed fermions) they first, in a sense, combine with the "flux quanta" of the magnetic field. Particularly for the first steps discovered by Störmer and Tsui, the electrons each capture three flux quanta, thus forming a kind of composite particle with no objection to condensing (they become what is termed bosons). Apart from its superfluidity, which explains the disappearance of Ohmic resistance at the Hall resistance steps, the new quantum fluid proposed by Laughlin has many unusual properties. One of the most remarkable is that if one electron is added the fluid will be affected (excited) and a number of fractionally charged "quasiparticles" created. These quasiparticles are not particles in the normal sense but a result of the common dance of electrons in the quantum fluid. Laughlin was the first to demonstrate that the quasiparticles have precisely the correct fractional charge to explain Störmer's and Tsui's results. Subsequent measurements have demonstrated more and more fractionally charged steps in the Hall effect (see figure 3), and Laughlin's quantum fluid has proved capable of explaining all the steps found experimentally.

Figure 3

1987 Bednorz, J. Georg, Müller, Karl Alex discovery of new superconducting materials

The Nobel Prize in Physics 1987 was awarded jointly to J. and K. Alexander Müller "for their important break-through in the discovery of superconductivity in ceramic materials" Superconductivity is a phenomenon of exactly zero electrical resistance and expulsion of magnetic fields occurring in certain materials when cooled below a characteristic critical temperature.

1986 Binnig, Gerd,Rohrer, Heinrich,Ruska, Ernst development of electron

A scanning electron microscope (SEM) is a type of electron microscope that produces images of a sample by scanning it with a focused beam of electrons. The electrons interact with electrons in the sample, producing various signals that can be detected and that contain information about the sample's surface topography and composition. The electron beam is generally scanned in a raster scan pattern, and the beam's position is combined with the detected signal to produce an image. SEM can achieve resolution better than 1 nanometer. Specimens can be observed in high vacuum, low vacuum and in Environmental SEM specimens can be observed in wet condition.

A scanning tunneling microscope (STM) is an instrument for imaging surfaces at the atomic level. The STM is based on the concept of quantum tunneling. When a conducting tip is brought very near to the surface to be examined, a bias (voltage difference) applied between the two can allow electrons to tunnel through the vacuum between them. The resulting tunneling current is a function of tip position, applied voltage, and the local (LDOS) of the sample. Information is acquired by monitoring the current as the tip's position scans across the surface, and is usually displayed in image form. STM can be a challenging technique, as it requires extremely clean and stable surfaces, sharp tips, excellent vibration control, and sophisticated electronics, but nonetheless many hobbyists have built their own.

Esaki Leo, Giaever, tunneling in semiconductors and 1973 Ivar superconductors

The Nobel Prize in Physics 1973 was divided, one half jointly to and Ivar Giaever "for their experimental discoveries regarding tunneling phenomena in semiconductors and superconductors, respectively" and the other half to Brian David Josephson "for his theoretical predictions of the properties of a supercurrent through a tunnel barrier, in particular those phenomena which are generally known as the Josephson effects".

1971 Gabor, Dennis invention of

Holography is a technique which enables three-dimensional images to be made. It involves the use of a laser, interference, diffraction, light intensity recording and suitable illumination of the recording. The image changes as the position and orientation of the viewing system changes in exactly the same way as if the object were still present, thus making the image appear three-dimensional. The holographic recording itself is not an image; it consists of an apparently random structure of varying intensity, density or profile. work in magnetohydrodynamics and 1970 Alfvén, Hannes, Néel, Louis-Eugène-Félix in antiferromagnetism and

ferrimagnetism

The Nobel Prize in Physics 1970 was divided equally between Hannes Olof Gösta Alfvén "for fundamental work and discoveries in magnetohydro- dynamics with fruitful applications in different parts of plasma physics" and Louis Eugène Félix Néel "for fundamental work and discoveries concerning antiferromagnetism and ferrimagnetism which have led to important applications in solid state physics".

Ferromagnetism is the basic mechanism by which certain materials (such as iron) form permanent magnets, or are attracted to magnets. In physics, several different types of magnetism are distinguished. (including ferrimagnetism) is the strongest type; it is the only type that creates forces strong enough to be felt, and is responsible for the common phenomena of magnetism encountered in everyday life. Other substances respond weakly to magnetic fields with two other types of magnetism, and , but the forces are so weak that they can only be detected by sensitive instruments in a . An everyday example of ferromagnetism is a refrigerator magnet used to hold notes on a refrigerator door. The attraction between a magnet and ferromagnetic material is "the of magnetism first apparent to the ancient world, and to us today".

In materials that exhibit antiferromagnetism, the magnetic moments of atoms or molecules, usually related to the spins of electrons, align in a regular pattern with neighboring spins (on different sublattices) pointing in opposite directions. This is, like ferromagnetism and ferrimagnetism, a manifestation of ordered magnetism. Generally, antiferromagnetic order may exist at sufficiently low temperatures, vanishing at and above a certain temperature, the Néel temperature (named after Louis Néel, who had first identified this type of magnetic ordering). Above the Néel temperature, the material is typicallyparamagnetic.

1930 Raman, Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata invention of

Raman spectroscopy is a spectroscopic technique used to observe vibrational, rotational, and other low-frequency modes in a system. It relies on inelastic scattering, or Raman scattering, of monochromaticlight, usually from a laser in the visible, near infrared, or near ultraviolet range. The laser light interacts with molecular vibrations, or other excitations in the system, resulting in the energy of the laser being shifted up or down. The shift in energy gives information about the vibrational modes in the system. Infrared spectroscopy yields similar, but complementary, information.

Although the inelastic scattering of light was predicted by Adolf Smekal in 1923, it is not until 1928 that it was observed in practice. The Raman effect was named after one of its discoverers, the Indian scientist Sir C. V. Raman who observed the effect by means of sunlight (1928, together with K. S. Krishnan and independently by Grigory Landsberg and ). Raman won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1930 for this discovery accomplished using sunlight, a narrow band photographic filter to create monochromatic light, and a "crossed filter" to block this monochromatic light. He found that a small amount of light had changed frequency and passed through the "crossed" filter.

Röntgen, Wilhelm 1901 discovery of X-rays

conrad X-radiation (composed of X-rays) is a form of electromagnetic radiation. X-rays have a wavelength in the range of 0.01 to 10 nanometers, corresponding to frequencies in the range 30 petahertz to 30exahertz (3×1016 Hz to 3×1019 Hz) and in the range 100 eV to 100 keV. They are shorter in wavelength than UV rays and longer than gamma rays. In many languages, X-radiation is called Röntgen radiation, after Wilhelm Röntgen, who is usually credited as its discoverer, and who had named it X-radiation to signify an unknown type of radiation. Correct spelling of X-ray(s) in the English language includes the variants x-ray(s) and X ray(s). X-rays with energies above 5-10 keV (below 0.2-0.1 nm wavelength), are called hard X-rays, while those with lower energy are called soft X-rays. Due to their penetrating ability hard X-rays are widely used to image the inside of objects e.g. in medical radiography and airport security. As a result, the term X- ray is metonymically used to refer to a radiographic image produced using this method, in addition to the method itself. Since the wavelengths of hard X-rays are similar to the size of atoms they are also useful for determining crystal structures by X- ray crystallography. By contrast, soft X-rays are easily absorbed in air and the attenuation length of 600 eV (~2 nm) X-rays in water is less than 1 micrometer.

1952 Bloch, Felix, Purcell, E.M. discovery of nuclear magnetic resonance in

Nuclear magnetic resonance was first described and measured in molecular beams by Isidor Rabi in 1938, and in 1944, Rabi was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics for this work. In 1946,Felix Bloch and expanded the technique for use on liquids and solids, for which they shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1952. Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is a physical phenomenon in which magnetic nuclei in a magnetic field absorb and re-emit electromagnetic radiation. This energy is at a specific resonance frequency which depends on the strength of the magnetic field and the magnetic properties of theisotope of the atoms; in practical applications, the frequency is similar to VHF and UHF television broadcasts (60–1000 MHz). NMR allows the observation of specific quantum mechanical magnetic properties of the atomic nucleus. Many scientific techniques exploit NMR phenomena to studymolecular physics, crystals, and non-crystalline materials through NMR spectroscopy. NMR is also routinely used in advanced medical imagingtechniques, such as in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).