- Born:
- May 20, 1945, Ried im Innkreis, Austria (age 81)
- Awards And Honors:
- Nobel Prize (2022)
- Subjects Of Study:
- quantum entanglement
Anton Zeilinger
-
Who is Anton Zeilinger?
Anton Zeilinger, born on May 20, 1945, is an Austrian physicist celebrated for his work on quantum entanglement. He was awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics, which he shared with John F. Clauser and Alain Aspect, for his experiments with quantum entanglement.
Zeilinger's work led to the development of quantum teleportation in 1997, where a state is transferred from one particle to another using quantum entanglement. In 1998, he and his collaborators entangled two particles of different origins, forming the basis for quantum cryptography. In 2006, his team established a secure key between islands over 144 km apart using this method.
Zeilinger has held professorships at multiple universities, including the University of Vienna. He is a member of several science academies globally and a recipient of awards such as the Isaac Newton Medal and the Wolf Prize.
1 Britannica SourceCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
What is quantum physics?
Quantum physics, or quantum mechanics, is a branch of physics that studies the very small, including atoms and subatomic particles. It posits that energy, momentum, and other physical quantities are quantized, meaning they can only take on discrete values.
Key concepts of quantum physics:
* Wave-particle duality Quantum mechanics holds that electromagnetic radiation does not always consist of continuous waves; instead it must be viewed under some circumstances as a collection of particle-like photons.
* Quantum entanglement A quantum characteristic of one particle is directly and immediately correlated with the equivalent characteristic of the others, regardless of space.
* Superposition Particles at the atomic scale can occupy multiple possible energy states simultaneously.Anton Zeilinger is an Austrian physicist who shared the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics for his experiments with quantum entanglement. Zeilinger's work has been the basis for initial efforts in quantum cryptography, and he is a member of several national science academies.
4 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
What are some important discoveries Anton Zeilinger is known for?
Anton Zeilinger is an Austrian physicist notable for his work in quantum entanglement and quantum technology. In 2022, he shared the Nobel Prize in Physics with John F. Clauser and Alain Aspect for his experiments with quantum entanglement.
Zeilinger's work includes:
* Quantum teleportation In 1997, Zeilinger and his collaborators used quantum entanglement to develop quantum teleportation, where a state transfers from one particle to another.
* Entanglement of separate particles In 1998, Zeilinger and his team entangled two particles without a shared origin by entangling one particle from two separate entangled pairs.
* Quantum cryptography Zeilinger's work has served as a basis for initial efforts in quantum cryptography, where entanglement is used to create a secure key. In 2006, his team established a secure key between the islands of La Palma and Tenerife.1 Britannica SourceCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
What is quantum entanglement, and how did Zeilinger study it?
Quantum entanglement is when subatomic particles are connected, and a quantum characteristic of one directly affects the others, regardless of distance.
Anton Zeilinger, an Austrian physicist and Nobel laureate, has done extensive work with quantum entanglement. In 1997, Zeilinger and his collaborators used quantum entanglement to develop quantum teleportation, where a state is transferred from one particle to another. In 1998, they entangled particles from different entangled pairs, forming the basis for quantum cryptography and secure key creation. In 2006, his team established a secure key between islands 144 km apart using this method.
2 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
How did Anton Zeilinger contribute to the field of quantum teleportation?
Anton Zeilinger, an Austrian physicist and Nobel laureate, significantly contributed to quantum teleportation. In 1997, Zeilinger and his collaborators used quantum entanglement to develop quantum teleportation, where a state is transferred from one particle to another. This process involves entangling one particle in an entangled pair with a third particle, giving the third particle the properties of the other particle in the original entangled pair. In 1998, Zeilinger's team entangled two particles from different entangled pairs, entangling the remaining particles, which has served as a basis for quantum cryptography.
2 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
Why did Anton Zeilinger win the Nobel Prize in Physics, and what impact did his work have on science?
Anton Zeilinger, an Austrian physicist, was awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on quantum entanglement. Quantum entanglement occurs when two systems share a common quantum mechanical state, and measuring a property of one particle instantly determines that same property in another particle, even when separated by great distances.
Zeilinger's work, along with American physicist John F. Clauser and French physicist Alain Aspect, has laid the groundwork for a new era of quantum technology. His work in 1997 led to the development of quantum teleportation, and in 1998, he and his collaborators entangled particles that did not share the same origin. Zeilinger's work has contributed to initial efforts in quantum cryptography, with the establishment of a secure key over a distance of 144 km between islands in Spain’s Canary Islands in 2006.
4 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
Anton Zeilinger (born May 20, 1945, Ried im Innkreis, Austria) is an Austrian physicist who was awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize for Physics for his experiments with quantum entanglement. He shared the prize with American physicist John F. Clauser and French physicist Alain Aspect. What happens to one particle in an entangled pair determines what happens to the other, even if they are really too far apart to affect each other. The laureates’ development of experimental tools has laid the foundation for a new era of quantum technology.
Zeilinger attended the University of Vienna and studied physics there from 1963 to 1971, when he graduated with a doctorate. During the 1970s he served as a research assistant at the Atominstitut Vienna and as a research associate in the Neutron Diffraction Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) before accepting the position of assistant professor at the Atominstitut Vienna in 1979. That same year he completed the process of habilitation (postdoctoral work earning the authorization to teach an entire academic subject at the university level) at the Vienna University of Technology. He returned to MIT in 1981 and served on the physics faculty as a visiting associate professor until 1983. During the remainder of the 1980s and the 1990s he accepted professorships at the Vienna University of Technology, the Technical University of Munich, the University of Innsbruck, and the University of Vienna. He served as the scientific director at the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information Vienna between 2004 and 2013 and the president of the Austrian Academy of Sciences from 2013 to 2022. He became an emeritus professor at the University of Vienna in 2013.
In quantum entanglement, two particles are in a single entangled state such that measuring a property of one particle instantly determines that same property in another particle. For example, two particles are in a state where one is spin-up and the other is spin-down. Since the second particle must have the opposite value of the first particle, measuring the first particle results in a definite state for the second particle, notwithstanding the fact that the two particles may be millions of kilometres apart and are not interacting with each other at the time. In 1935, when physicists Albert Einstein, Boris Podolsky, and Nathan Rosen analyzed quantum entanglement, they thought that this conclusion was so obviously false that the quantum mechanical theory on which it was based must be incomplete. They concluded that the correct theory would contain some hidden variable feature that would restore the determinism of classical physics; that is, the particles must be in some definite spin even before they are measured.
Zeilinger and his collaborators used quantum entanglement in 1997 to develop quantum teleportation, in which a state is transferred from one particle to another. This is done by entangling one particle in an entangled pair with a third particle. The third particle then has the properties of the other particle in the original entangled pair. In 1998 Zeilinger and his collaborators were even able to entangle two particles that did not have the same origin: by entangling one particle each from two different entangled pairs, the other particles in the pairs became entangled. Such work has served as the basis of initial efforts in quantum cryptography, in which entanglement is used to create a secure key. In 2006 Zeilinger and his collaborators established a secure key between the islands of La Palma and Tenerife, 144 km (89 miles) apart in Spain’s Canary Islands.
Zeilinger is a member of several national science academies, including those of Austria, China, France, Germany, Romania, Russia, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, and the United States. He is a recipient of several awards, including the Sartorius Prize (2001), the Isaac Newton Medal of the Institute of Physics (2008), the Wolf Prize (2010, shared with Clauser and Aspect), and the TWAS Medal Lecture of the World Academy of Sciences (2015).