2003 Nobel Prize in Physics

The 2003 Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded to Alexei Abrikosov, Vitaly L. Ginzburg and Anthony J. Leggett. The prize was announced by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm on 7 October 2003.

The citation

The citation reads: "for pioneering contributions to the theory of superconductors and superfluids". They share the prize equally.

The laureates

Alexei Abrikosov was born in 1928 in Moscow, USSR (now Russia), and is affiliated with Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne. Vitaly L. Ginzburg was born in 1916 in Moscow, Russia, and is affiliated with P.N. Lebedev Physical Institute, Moscow. Anthony J. Leggett was born in 1938 in London, United Kingdom, and is affiliated with the University of Illinois, Urbana.

Why it matters

Superconductors carry electricity without resistance, and superfluids flow without friction. The theories of the three physicists explain these strange states of matter. Leggett was born in London and works in the United States.

The prize

The prize is worth 10 million Swedish kronor, divided between the laureates. It will be presented at a ceremony in Stockholm on 10 December, the anniversary of the death of Alfred Nobel, the Swedish inventor of dynamite whose will founded the prizes in 1895.