Quantum particle work wins Nobel for French, American

A French and an American scientist won the Nobel Prize on Tuesday for finding ways to measure quantum particles without destroying them, which could make it possible to build a new kind of computer far more powerful than any seen before.

Serge Haroche of France and David Wineland of US, both 68, found ways to manipulate the very smallest particles of matter and light to observe strange behaviour that previously could only be imagined in thought experiments.

The Nobel laureates have opened the door to a new era of experimentation with quantum physics by demonstrating the direct observation of individual quantum particles without destroying them, said the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which awarded them the 8 million crown ($1.2 million) Nobel Prize in Physics.

Perhaps the quantum computer will change our everyday lives in this century in the same radical way as the classical computer did in the last century. Haroche told Reuters he hoped the prize would give him a platform that will allow me to communicate ideas, not just in this field of research but for research in general, fundamental research.

Physics is the second of this year's crop of awards; scientists from Britain and Japan shared the first prize on Monday, in medicine.

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