The 2025 Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded to Americans John Clarke, Michel H. Devoret, and John M. Martinis for their fundamental contributions to quantum mechanics.
According to Swedish academics, Clarke, Devoret and Martinis, the fathers of quantum computing , had the merit of demonstrating the possibility of reproducing in a system large enough to fit in the palm of a hand the bizarre behavior of matter in the infinitely small world , interpreted by the laws of quantum mechanics.
In particular, they created a superconducting electrical system capable of passing from one state to another using the tunnel effect , as if it were passing through a wall.
They also demonstrated that their system absorbs and emits energy in specific doses, just as predicted by quantum mechanics.
The experiments of the three physicists were fundamental to understanding quantum mechanics with measurable evidence.
Martinis led the Google project that in 2019 marked the first quantum supremacy, the demonstration that a quantum computer could perform a task much faster than a traditional computer.
WHO THEY ARE – Although two are European by birth, the three Nobel laureates have been working in the United States for a long time, and two of them, Michel H. Devoret and John Martinis, also work for a private company, the Google Quantum AI Lab.
John Clarke, 83, was born in Cambridge, Great Britain, in 1942. He is affiliated with the University of California, Berkeley, where he is a professor of experimental physics.
Michel H. Devoret, 72, was born in Paris, France, and was a professor of applied physics at Yale University. He now works at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is currently the chief scientific officer of Google Quantum AI.
John M. Martinis, 67, works at the University of California, Santa Barbara and has been working for the Google Quantum AI Lab since 2014 on the task of building a superconducting quantum computer.
