2005年NPR美国国家公共电台九月-Laser Work Earns Trio Nobel Prize for Phy（在线收听） |
| This is All Things Considered. I'm Michelle Norris. Phone calls from Sweden woke up two American scientists this morning, John Hall and Roy Glauber. They will share the Nobel Prize for Physics with a German Researcher Theodor Haensch. All three worked in various ways on the physics of light. The work has a handful of practical applications but not many, as NPR's David Kestenbaum reports. Roy Glauber got the phone call early this morning. When it reached him at 7:30, he was still wearing his pajamas and a neighbour has just brought over a cup of coffee. Glauber is eighty years old and a physicist at Harvard. He's sharing the prize for his theoretical work , pencil and paper equations, done in the 1960s that formed the basis of something called "quantum optics". His work explained after the laser was invented how it was the darn thing actually worked in full detail. And it provided the fundamental framework for how particles of light interact with atoms and molecules. “There are a few aha moments, but it was done over a period of time when these realizations dawned in, somewhat gradually. But yes, there are a few aha moments. I'll be hard put to describe them because it’s mathematical.” ”I see. Any idea what you are gonna do with the money?” ”I don't even know what the money is. No one has told me, and I haven't heard a word. “ “According to this, you get one half of one point three million dollars.” ”My heaven, that's the first word I’ve heard. Very interesting. The answer to your question is I haven't the faintest idea.” Also this morning, on Davidson place in Boulder, Colorado. An excited dog chased the reporter off the front lawn. The house is the home of Physicist John Hall. Hall is 71 years old and will share the other half of the Nobel Prize with German Theodor Haensch for their experimental work. Working together and sometimes in competition, they perfected a way to measure colors or frequencies of light very, very accurately, to 15 decimal places. ”I think there may be 8 of us , we are supported for ten years building this fantastic dinosaur, even though it is the first one on the earth to measure optical frequencies. “ Eventually, Hall's dinosaur, a fancy optical laser device helped redefine how distance itself is measured. Once upon a time, a meter was defined as one ten-millionth of the distance from the North Pole to the equator passing through Paris. Then it was a metal bar with two notches in it. Today, the meter is pegged instead to the speed of light. The work of Haensch and Hall made that possible. It also allowed the physicists to measure the internal structure of the atom with new precision. Hall says he never expected to win the Nobel Prize. “No ,no. I've been even surprised that I would be paid to do such interesting things. In earlier times, scientists were independently wealthy and they did what they thought was the most interesting thing to do and they paid for it themselves. I've been hugely lucky to be employed by NIST for 43 years or something. “ NIST is a government agency, the National Institution of Standards and Technology. Hall also works at the University of Colorado. If all this sounds a little esoteric, it is right now. Den Clapner is a physicist at MIT, he brought the coffee over to Roy Glauber's house this morning. The applications of revolutionary devices come later, because one hasn't had time to think about the possibilities. I'm sure that there will be very important applications. The devices, they are so powerful. They open up so many new areas we're just learning about. This year's prizes also remind/ us that physics has been around for centuries, the easy questions were answered long ago. David Kestenbaum. NPR news. |
| 原文地址：http://www.tingroom.com/lesson/NPR2005/40650.html |