Prof. Aharonov is nominated to win the Nobel Prize for the theoretical prediction of the "Aharonov-Bohm effect" * His candidacy was recommended back in 1992 by the editor of Nature. The winner, whoever it is, will be announced this Tuesday at noon
Prof. (Emeritus) Yakir Aharonov from the School of Physics of Tel Aviv University is ranked at the top of the list of candidates expected to win the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2009. This distinguished list is prepared every year by the Thomson-Reuters company, which is considered the leader in measuring global citations of academic articles in all the domains. This was announced this evening by Tel Aviv University.
Prof. Aharonov is nominated to win the Nobel Prize for the theoretical prediction of the "Aharonov-Bohm effect" which was confirmed experimentally and greatly influenced the development of the fundamentals of quantum mechanics. The effect clearly shows that in quantum theory the nature of electromagnetic forces is very profoundly different from the way they work in classical physics. For this important discovery Prof. Aharonov was awarded the Wolf Prize for Physics.
The discovery took place in 1953 as part of his doctoral thesis. Then Aaronov discovered a strange phenomenon where an electric particle moves in a region where there is no magnetic field but the magnetic potential is not zero. Aharonov is the one who came up with the idea, and his mentor, physicist David Bohm, helped him put it into writing. This toss is now named after them - "The Aharonov-Bohm Toss." John Maddox, the editor of the journal Nature, wrote in an editorial in December 1992 that Aaronov deserved the Nobel Prize in Physics for his discovery. In the meantime, he was awarded the prestigious Wolf Prize, which is one of the markers for a future Nobel Prize, in 1998.
In Aharonov's biography on the website of the AMT Prize, which he won in 2006, it is stated that other effects and discoveries bear his name and the names of his partners, among them: the Aharonov-Kosher effect (1984), the geometric phase of Aharonov-Annanden (1987) and the formulation of the idea of quantum walking Random created by Aharonov-Davidovich-Zagori (1993).
He is a member of the Academies of Sciences of Israel and the United States. His work earned him many prizes, including: the Weizmann Prize for Physics and the Rothschild Prize (1984), the Israel Prize for Physics (1989), the Carson Medal of the Franklin Institute (1991), the European Prize in Physics from Hewitt-Packard (1995), the Wolff Prize (1998) as well as Ph.D. Honorary (from the Technion, the University of South Carolina, the University of Bristol and the University of Buenos Aires).
This coming Tuesday, October 6, 2009, we will know if Israel has another winner of the most prestigious academic award in the world. In the meantime, the very nomination is a certificate of honor for Prof. Aharonov, for Tel Aviv University and for Israeli physics.
On the dates between October 11 and October 14, a scientific conference will be held at Tel Aviv University in honor of the 50th anniversary of Prof. Aharonov's groundbreaking work. The conference will be attended by world-class scientists, including the winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2004, Prof. David Gross from the University of California at Santa Barbara.
11 תגובות
In an interview conducted with him, Prof. Aharonov told about the discovery method of the Aharonov Boehm effect, as follows:
"I was looking at the same equations that everyone had been looking at for years and suddenly I saw something different. As soon as I told Boehm about the idea, the physicist was already there who started doing experiments to prove the theory."
The story demonstrates one of the virtues required of a truly great scientist: the creative proof of existing knowledge, leading to a deep and new insight. If this virtue exists, it can be said that the whole sequel is a fixed chronicle and known in advance.
By the way, Sir Michael Berry has already won the 2000 Ignoble Prize for the magnetic levitation experiment of a frog.
Aaronov is not nominated alone, his partner in the nomination is Sir Michael Berry, famous for the geometric phase named after him - the Berry phase, the two even shared the Wolf Prize together.
By the way, I am not sure that Aaronov is at the top of the list because he is the leading candidate, but simply because the list
It is alphabetical.
Liran, it's not really related. In the 50s and 60s, the level of education in Israel was very high and there was a high importance and prestige for science and those involved in it. I personally would prefer that these 140 million shekels were transferred to associations that help those in need. As for strengthening the budget of the chief scientist and the higher education institutions in Israel, that is another story. In my opinion, we are really missing out in a big way, especially the young people.
Well done
If the government would transfer the 140 million budget of "improving ministerial security" to academic education, we would see many more Israelis on these lists. Be sure that he achieved his achievements solely on his own merits and not with any help from the Ministry of Education or any other government ministry.
Anyway, good luck to him and may there be more people like him in Israel.
Good luck. I have no idea why, but in the picture here he mentions Feynman. I know they don't look alike on the outside but that's how it looks, at least to me.
Perhaps it should be noted that the Aharonov Boehm effect was discovered while Aharonov was a doctoral student at the Technion (Boehm served as a professor at the Technion for two years). Of course, news published by Tel Aviv University will omit such details from Aharonov's biography.
By the way, there is no chance that Boehm will share the award because he died in 1992
We will not be silent. We will raise a shout that will shake the academic world until our Judah wins the long-awaited prize.
At least give him the Ignoval Award.
They are all anti-Semitic
Wait, I didn't understand, Sabdarmish Yehuda is not a candidate this year either?
Good luck to him.
His success is his success only (and Boehm's), not all of us 🙂