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Johannes Georg Bednorz

 
Scientist: Johannes Georg Bednorz
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German physicist (1950–)

Bednorz was educated at the Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich, where he gained his PhD in 1982. He immediately joined the staff of the IBM Research Center in Zurich.

Here he was invited by his senior colleague, Alex Muller, to collaborate in a search for superconductors with higher critical temperatures. Little progress had been made in this area for a decade and, as a young unknown scientist, Bednorz's decision to work in such an unpromising field appeared to many to be somewhat rash. Success, however, came relatively quickly and in 1986 Bednorz and Muller found a mixed lanthanum, barium, and copper oxide that had a critical temperature of 35 K (–238°C), which was significantly higher than that of any other superconductor known at the time. Their work was quickly recognized and in 1987 Muller and Bednorz were awarded the Nobel Prize for physics.

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Columbia Encyclopedia: Johannes Georg Bednorz
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Bednorz, Johannes Georg (yōhän'əs gāôrkh' bĕd'nôrts), 1950-, German physicist. After earning his doctorate from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, he began (1982) work at the IBM Zürich Research Laboratory with Karl Alex Müller. In 1983 they discovered superconductivity in a ceramic fragment at temperatures much higher than had been previously thought possible. Their discovery made possible applications in power lines, generators, and computers. In 1987, Bednorz and Müller were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics.
Wikipedia: Johannes Georg Bednorz
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Johannes Georg Bednorz

Born May 16, 1950 (age 58)
Neuenkirchen, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
Nationality German
Fields Physics
Doctoral advisor Heini Gränicher,
Karl Alexander Müller
Known for High-temperature superconductivity
Notable awards 1987 Nobel Prize in Physics

Johannes Georg Bednorz (born May 16, 1950) is a German physicist who shared the 1987 Nobel Prize in Physics for work in high-temperature superconductivity.

Life and work

Bednorz was born in Neuenkirchen, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany to Anton and Elisabeth Bednorz.[1]

In 1968, Bednorz started his studies in Mineralogy at the University of Münster. After working for a while in the IBM Zürich Research Laboratory, he started his PhD in the Laboratory of Solid State Physics at ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology), supervised by Prof. Heini Gränicher and K. Alex Müller (who was a professor at ETH Zürich as well as working for IBM).

In 1982, he moved back to IBM's Zürich lab. There, he joined Müller's ongoing research into superconductivity.[2]

In 1983, Bednorz and Müller began a systematic study of the electrical properties of ceramics formed from transition metal oxides, and in 1986, they succeeded in inducing superconductivity in a lanthanum barium copper oxide (LaBaCuO, also known as LBCO); the oxide's critical temperature (Tc) was 35 K, a full 12 K higher than the previous record. This discovery stimulated a great deal of additional research in high-temperature superconductivity on cuprate materials with structures similar to LBCO, soon leading to the discovery of compounds such as BSCCO (Tc 107K) and YBCO (Tc 92K).

In 1987, Bednorz and Müller were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics "for their important break-through in the discovery of superconductivity in ceramic materials".[3]

References

  1. ^ Nobel prize autobiography
  2. ^ J. G. Bednorz and K. A. Müller (1986). "Possible high Tc superconductivity in the Ba−La−Cu−O system". Z. Physik, B 64 (1): 189–193. doi:10.1007/BF01303701. 
  3. ^ Nobel prize website

External links

v • d • e
Nobel Laureates in Physics

Burton Richter / Samuel C. C. Ting (1976) · Philip Anderson / Nevill Mott / John van Vleck (1977) · Pyotr Kapitsa / Arno Penzias / Robert Wilson (1978) · Sheldon Glashow / Abdus Salam / Steven Weinberg (1979) · James Cronin / Val Fitch (1980) · Nicolaas Bloembergen / Arthur Schawlow / Kai Siegbahn (1981) · Kenneth G. Wilson (1982) · Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar / William Fowler (1983) · Carlo Rubbia / Simon van der Meer (1984) · Klaus von Klitzing (1985) · Ernst Ruska / Gerd Binnig / Heinrich Rohrer (1986) · Johannes Bednorz / Karl Müller (1987) · Leon M. Lederman / Melvin Schwartz / Jack Steinberger (1988) · Norman Ramsey / Hans Dehmelt / Wolfgang Paul (1989) · Jerome Friedman / Henry Kendall / Richard E. Taylor (1990) · Pierre de Gennes (1991) · Georges Charpak (1992) · Russell Hulse / Joseph Taylor (1993) · Bertram Brockhouse / Clifford Shull (1994) · Martin Perl / Frederick Reines (1995) · D. Lee / Douglas D. Osheroff / Robert Richardson (1996) · Steven Chu / Claude Cohen-Tannoudji / William Phillips (1997) · Robert B. Laughlin / Horst Störmer / Daniel C. Tsui (1998) · Gerardus 't Hooft / Martinus J. G. Veltman (1999) · Zhores Alferov / Herbert Kroemer / Jack Kilby (2000)

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Scientist. A Dictionary of Scientists. Copyright © Market House Books Ltd 1993, 1999, 2003. All rights reserved.  Read more
Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/.  Read more
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