Dr. Ivar Giaever, an RPI graduate, was awarded a share of the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physics last week.
He is the first graduate of the Institute to receive the Nobel Prize.
The award recognizes his research on tunneling phenomena in superconductors conducted at the General Electric Research and Development Center in Schenectady.
Giaever will share half of the $121,000 total prize money with Dr. Leo Esaki at IBM and Dr. Brian D. Josephson at Cambridge University.
The three honorees will each be given a gold medal during ceremonies in Sweden on December 10, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death.
Although the superconductivity phenomenon was discovered in 1911, the currently accepted scientific theory of superconductivity was not advanced until 1957.
Giaever’s experimental research produced what he calls a "very nice proof of the theory" and led to his recognition for the Nobel Prize.
