Washington, October 06: A Pioneer in fibre optics and two scientists who figured out how to turn light into electronic signals -work that paved the way for the Internet age – were awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize for physics.
Charles Kao, a Shanghai-born British-American, won half the 10 million Swedish crown ($1.4 million) prize for a discovery that led to a breakthrough in fibre optics, determining how to transmit light over long distances via optical glass fibres.
Willard Boyle, a Canadian-American, and George Smith of the United States shared the other half for inventing the first successful imaging technology using a digital sensor.
“This year’s Nobel prize in physics is awarded for two scientific achievements that have helped to shape the foundations of today’s networked societies,” the award-winning committee said in a statement.
Their achievements have allowed vast amounts of information to be sent around the globe almost instantaneously, as trillions of signals make their way through tiny glass fibres now long enough to encircle the planet more than 25,000 times.
—Agencies