The 2023 Nobel Prize in Physics has recognized the experiments of Pierre Agostini from Ohio State University, Ferenc Krausz from the Max Planck Institute for Quantum Optics in Garching (Germany) and Anne L’Huillier from Lund (Sweden), who have provided humanity with new tools to explore the world of electrons inside atoms and molecules.

The experiments of the winners have achieved that can obtain images of processes inside atoms and molecules with the help of attoseconds, a measure in which changes in electrons are made and which “is so short that there are as many in a second as there have been seconds since the birth of the universe.”

“Now we can open the door to the world of electrons. The attosecond physics gives us the opportunity to understand electron-governed mechanisms. The next step will be to use them,” says Eva Olsson, President of the Nobel Committee in Physics, in statements collected on the entity’s website.

Thus, he explains that there are potential applications in many different areas. In electronics, for example, it is important to understand and control how devices behave. electrons in a material. Attosecond pulses can also be used to identify different moleculesfor example in medical diagnoses.

The Nobel Prize in Physics is the second in the round of these prestigious awards, afterannounced yesterday Monday that of Medicine and waiting for the winners of Chemistry, Literature, Peace and finally the winner of Economics to be announced on successive days, next Monday.