Nobel Prize in Physics awarded to Pierre, Ferenc and Anne L’Huillier for using electrons to study light

Scientists Pierre Agostini, Ferenc Krausz and Anne L’Huillier were awarded the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physics “for experimental methods that generate attosecond pulses of light for the study of electron dynamics in the matter.”

These scientists have been recognised for their “experiments, which have given humanity new tools for exploring the world of electrons inside atoms and molecules”, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, the award-giving body, said in a statement.

Their work could advance medical diagnostics and electronics, it added.

“Pierre Agostini, Ferenc Krausz and Anne L’Huillier have demonstrated a way to create extremely short pulses of light that can be used to measure the rapid processes in which electrons move or change energy,” it said.

“The laureates’ contributions have enabled the investigation of processes that are so rapid they were previously impossible to follow,” it added.

What was the experiment about?

As mentioned, these scientists carried out an experiment thatgenerated attosecond pulses of light. An attosecond is one-quintillionth of a second, or one-billionth of a nanosecond.

This experimentallows scientists to look at the very smallest particles at the very shortest timescales, in this case in an attosecond. The laureates developed experiments to be able to produce these ultrafast laser pulses, which can be used to probe our world at the smallest scales and have applications across chemistry, biology and physics.

L'Huillier fifth woman to receive Nobel Prize in physics

Addressing a news conference after the announcement, L'Huillier,who is only the fifth woman to receive a Nobel in physics, said, "It is really a prestigious prize and I'm so happy to get it. It's incredible."

L'Huillier works at Lund University in Sweden, while Agostini is a professor at Ohio State University. Krausz is the director at Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics.

The Nobel Prizes carry a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor ($1 million). The money comes from a bequest left by the prize's creator, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel, who died in 1896.

The announcement came a day after Hungarian scientist Katalin Kariko and her American colleague Drew Weissman won the medicine prize for making mRNA molecule discoveries that paved the way for COVID-19 vaccines.

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