FEW physicists can say that their work has had a profound impact on the lives
of most people alive today. But three scientists whose pioneering work ushered
in the era of microelectronics and the ubiquitous silicon chip can make such a
claim, and they have won this year’s Nobel Prize in Physics for their
efforts.
Russian-born Zhores Alferov of the Ioffe Physico-Technical Institute in St
Petersburg, Russia, and Herbert Kroemer of the University of California at Santa
Barbara shared half of the £625,000 prize. They won their award for
developing fast microelectronic and optoelectronic components made of layered
semiconductors…
