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Moungi Bawendi, Louis Brus and Alexei Ekimov developed and discovered quantum dots, particles whose size governs their properties.
By Emma Bubola and Katrina Miller
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded on Wednesday to Moungi G. Bawendi, Louis E. Brus and Alexei I. Ekimov for being pioneers of the nanoworld. The new laureates discovered and developed quantum dots, semiconductors made of particles squeezed so small that their electrons barely have room to breathe.
Semiconductors are crystals that help power our electronics. But while traditional crystals may be quite large at the molecular level, a quantum dot consists of just a few thousand atoms squished into a space just a few nanometers across. The difference in size between a quantum dot and a soccer ball is about the same as the difference between a soccer ball and the Earth, the Nobel Foundation said.
“For a long time, nobody thought you could ever actually make such small particles,” Johan Aqvist, the chair of the Academy’s Nobel committee for chemistry, said at the news conference announcing the 2023 laureates. Presenting the topic with five colorful flasks lined up in front of him, which he said contained quantum dots in a liquid solution, he said, “But this year’s laureates succeeded.”
The news of the laureates’ expected win had been reported earlier Wednesday morning in the Swedish news media, a highly unusual leak that was then reported by Reuters and The Associated Press several hours before the official announcement by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which awards the prize.
The Swedish news outlets cited what they said was an email from the Academy that had been mistakenly sent early. Reuters quoted Dr. Aqvist as saying, “It is a mistake by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.” He noted that the committee’s meeting was due to start at 9:30 a.m. local time (3:30 a.m. Eastern) and added: “So no decision has been made yet. The winners have not been selected.”
Who are the winners?
Dr. Bawendi, born in 1961 in France, is a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and used to study under Dr. Brus as a postdoctoral researcher.
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