According to Olle Eriksson, chairman of the Nobel Committee for Physics, “It is wonderful to celebrate how century-old quantum mechanics continually offers new surprises. Moreover, it is enormously useful, as quantum mechanics is the basis of all digital technology.”
The award was given to these scientists “for the discovery of macroscopic quantum mechanical tunneling and energy quantization in an electrical circuit.”
Clarke, Devoret, and Martinis conducted experiments with an electrical circuit in which they demonstrated both quantum mechanical tunneling and quantized energy levels in a system large enough to hold in the hand, according to reports.
It was also highlighted that this year’s Nobel Prize in Physics has provided opportunities to develop the next generation of quantum technology, including quantum cryptography, quantum computers, and quantum sensors.
Reviews emphasize that the laureates’ experiments took quantum mechanical effects from a microscopic to a macroscopic scale, and the transistors in computer microchips are an example of the established quantum technology that surrounds us.
Clarke, a British national, is a professor at the University of California, Berkeley; Devoret, a French national, works at Yale University and the University of California, Santa Barbara; and Martinis, an American, is at UC Santa Barbara.
jdt/mem/dla
