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Trio Win Nobel Physics Prize

Stockholm (September 03, 2018): Three scientists on Tuesday won the Nobel Physics Prize, including the first woman to receive the prestigious award in 55 years, for inventing optical lasers that have paved the way for advanced precision instruments used in corrective eye surgery, industry and medicine.

Arthur Ashkin of the United States won one half of the nine-million Swedish kronor (about $1.01 million or 870,000 euros) prize, while Gerard Mourou of France and Donna Strickland of Canada shared the other half.“The inventions being honoured this year have revolutionized laser physics,” the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said as it awarded the trio the $1 million prize. “Advanced precision instruments are opening up unexplored areas of research and a multitude of industrial and medical applications,” it said.

It is pertinent to mention here that Donna Strickland, from Canada, is only the third woman winner of the award, along with Marie Curie, who won in 1903, and Maria Goeppert-Mayer, who was awarded the prize in 1963.Dr Strickland shares this year’s prize with Arthur Ashkin, from the US, and Gerard Mourou, from France. Dr Ashkin developed a laser technique described as optical tweezers, which is used to study biological systems.

She said it was “surprising” it had been such a long time since a woman had won the award. However, she stressed that she had “always been treated as an equal”, and that “two men also won it with me, and they deserve this prize as much if not more than me”.

Whereas the Nobel Prize in medicine was awarded Monday to two researchers from the United States and Japan for advances in discovering how the body’s immune system can fight off the scourge of cancer.

The next Nobel to be awarded will be for chemistry. The winner of the Nobel Peace Prize will be named Friday.

No literature prize is being given this year, but the Swedish Academy that awards the prestigious prize is still in the limelight.

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