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Cosmologist George Smoot Wins Nobel Prize in Physics
American cosmologist George Smoot, 61, who headed a satellite research team
that collected data to map the first images of the primordial universe, has
been awarded the 2006 Nobel prize in Physics. Smoot, professor of physics at
University of California at Berkeley and astrophysicist at the Lawrence
Berkeley National Laboratory, shares this honour with fellow American John C.
Mather, 60, of NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, who co-directed the research
group. The citation for their win reads, ˇ°for their discovery of the
blackbody form and anisotropy of the cosmic microwave background radiation".
Smoot was born on February 20, 1945 in Yukon, Florida to a U.S. Geological
Survey geologist and a science teacher. After double majoring in physics and
mathematics at MIT, he received a B.S. and later, a Ph.D. in physics from MIT
in 1970 for his work on the decay of subatomic particles. However, he soon
turned his attention to the field of cosmology, which led him in 1974 to
become the head of a project named COBE (COsmic Background Explorer) with the
task of finding evidence of the origins of the universe.
18 years later on 1 May 1992, at a meeting of the American Physical Society,
Smoot presented the startling findings culled from hundreds of millions of
precision measurements in the data obtained from the COBE satellite. These
findings heralded a new age in cosmology in its evolution into a precise
science with empirical data supporting theoretical calculations.
The map of the ˇ°hot" and ˇ°cold" regions with differing densities in the
infant universe that Smoot showed was essentially a baby photo of the
universe, displaying the universe as it looked around 300,000 years after its
birth. The extremely small temperature variations (in the range of a hundred-
thousandth of a degree) measured from the cosmic background radiation ¨C relic
radiant energy that has been called ˇ°a message from the beginning of time" --
serves as strong evidence for the Big Bang theory and demonstrates how
galaxies aggregated over time.
This discovery was of great historic significance. Said Per Carlson, Head of
the Nobel Physics Committee in Sweden, ˇ°If there were no fluctuations like
that, the universe would be very uniform ¨C no stars, no galaxies, no us. It
is one of the greatest discoveries of the century. I would call it the
greatest."
Smoot himself was surprised on receiving the call from the Nobel Committee in
Sweden informing him of his Nobel Prize. He said, ˇ°I wasn't absolutely sure
until I ran to my computer and pulled up the Nobel web page. Then I believed
it."
The Nobel prizes include a $1.4 million cheque, a gold medal and a diploma,
and will be presented on 10 Dec, the anniversary of Nobel's death in 1896.
Smoot commented that he will have to reschedule a test for his students
scheduled on the day of the ceremony, but added, ˇ°the upshot though is that
maybe now my students will pay more attention to me."
Professor Smoot's articles "Cosmic Microwave Background Anisotropy Current
and Future Experiments" and "Cosmic Microwave Background Anisotropy Spectrum
from Primordial Density Perturbations" can be found in the Proceedings of the
Third Paris Cosmology Colloquium within the Framework of the International
School of Astrophysics 'DANIEL CHALONGE'.
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