Americans, German win physics Nobel for optics

Americans Roy Glauber and John Hall and Germany's Theodor Haensch won the 2005 Nobel Physics prize for work in the field of optics.

Americans Roy Glauber and John Hall and Germany's Theodor Haensch won the 2005 Nobel Physics prize for work in the field of optics, said the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on Tuesday.

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Harvard University's Glauber wins half of the 10 million crown ($1.29 million) prize for his theoretical description of the behaviour of light particles. He established in 1963 the basis of quantum optics in which quantum theory encompasses the field of optics, the Academy said in its citation.

"He could explain the fundamental differences between hot sources of light such as light bulbs, with a mixture of frequencies and phases, and lasers which give a specific frequency and phase," it said.

Hall and Haensch, from the University of Colorado and the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich respectively, worked on determining the colour of the light in atoms and molecules with extreme precision.

Their findings "have made it possible to measure frequencies with an accuracy of fifteen digits", for use in highly accurate clocks and new technology for global positioning systems.