Beautiful mathematics gave the nobel Prize – financial times

Noble. Three britons working in the US, David Thouless, Duncan Haldane and Michael Kosterlitz, will receive this year’s nobel Prize in physics.

They have studied one of science’s most complicated and mysterious areas – how matter behaves in the so-called plattlandet.

plattlandet refers to phenomena that arise in a world that is so flat or thin that it is two-dimensional.

The world is real when it comes to, for example, liquid helium, thin films of superconductor, the thin layer of magnetic material, and nanowires.

The three laureates have advanced mathematical calculations successfully describe how different types of flat matter passes from one phase to another. This branch of mathematics is called topology.

– They have done a very beautiful work. It really is wonderful mathematics, ” says Thors Hans Hansson, professor in theoretical physics at Stockholm university and member of the Academy of sciences.

quantum computers

In recent years it has become clear that the condition for which the laureates described not only in plattlandet, but also of the usual three-dimensional materials. This has given rise to practical research aimed at constructing new electronics, and superconductors.

In the long term, it may be possible to build quantum computers that can do extremely complicated calculations in a matter of a second.

on the link at the announcement of the prize was Duncan Haldane, who works at Princeton University in the united states.

– I was very surprised and very grateful, ” he answers the question of how he reacted when he learned that he had received the Nobel prize.

Hard even for mathematicians

Now, many incredible discoveries based on this research, he believes. But then, he thought, not from the beginning.

– When I started working on this during the late 80′s, I did not understand that it could be used, ” he says.

– You stumble across it and need to realize that this is something interesting. So it is with all research. But you realize it’s not until others see it. Once you see it you think: Why has no one else thought of it before? says Haldane.

as a layman, understand the researchers ‘ discoveries is not easy – it becomes almost hopeless to explain for those who do not master the advanced mathematics, according to Mats Larsson, member of the nobel Committee for the physics prize.

On the other hand, he adds, it took a long time even for most mathematicians to grasp the content of the studies for which the laureates have published over the years.

But with these methods it has gotten a grip on the peculiar condition that was previously unknown or svårförklarliga.

the FACTS

award winners

David Thouless was born in 1934 in the Uk and is a professor at the university of Washington in the united states.

65-year-old Duncan Haldane from London, Uk, is a physics professor at Princeton University in the united states.

MIchael Kosterlitz, 73 years, born in Aberdeen, the Uk. He is a professor at Brown University, Providence, in the united states.

key Facts: Royal Swedish academy of Sciences

TT

4 October 201613:24