This year’s Nobel Prize in physics has been awarded to three scientists for looking at electrons in atoms during the tiniest of split seconds. The coveted prize has been awarded to Pierre Agostini of The Ohio State University in the US, Ferenc Krausz of the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics and Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich in Germany, and Anne L'Huillier of Lund University in Sweden.
The award was announced by Hans Ellegren, the secretary-general of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, in Stockholm on Tuesday. According to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, scientists have been awarded for the "experimental methods that generate attosecond pulses of light for the study of electron dynamics in matter.” They 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 added.
Notably, L'Huillier is only the fifth woman to win a Nobel in physics. She expressed her happiness after winning the award. "This is the most prestigious and I am so happy to get this prize. It's incredible. As you know there are not so many women who got this prize so it's very special," L'Huillier told reporters.
About Nobel Prize
It should be mentioned here that 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.
(With inputs from AP)
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