Three Scientists Andrea M Ghez, Roger Penrose and Reinhard Genzel have been honoured with the Nobel Prize for Physics, 2020 for their research on black holes.
Roger Penrose begged the Nobel Prize for the discovery that reveals that the formation of the black hole is a robust prediction of the theory of relativity. In a nutshell, it means that the theory of relativity has led to the discovery of black holes.
Andrea Ghez and Reinhard Genzel begged the prize for their discovery of supermassive black hole at the centre of Milky Way Galaxy. Andrea after being honoured with the Nobel Prize became the 4th woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Physics Category.
The prize money of 10 million USD will be shared between the three scientists.
What we will discuss:
- Women who have won the Nobel Prize in Physics
- More About Nobel Prize for Physics
- What is Black Hole?
Women who have won the Nobel Prize in Physics
Only 4 women have won the Nobel Prize in Physics till date – Marie Curie in 1903, Maria Goeppert-Mayer in 1963, Donna Strickland in 2018 and Andrea Ghez in 2020. Marie Curie has won Noble Prize also for Chemistry in the year 2011. She is the only woman who has won the prize in two categories.
However, the women who have been awarded the Nobel Prize in recent times include Andrea M. Ghez in Physics (2020), Esther Duflo in Economics (2019), Olga Tokarczuk in Literature (2018), Frances Arnold in Chemistry (2018), Donna Strickland in Physics (2018) and Nadia Murad for Peace (2018).
More About Nobel Prize for Physics
- The Nobel Prize in Physics is an annual award given by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences to those who have made the most outstanding contributions for humankind in the field of physics, as claimed by Wikipedia.
- Between 1901 and 2020, The Nobel Prize in Physics has been conferred 114 times to 216 Nobel Laureates.
- Sir C V Raman is the only Indian who has received Nobel Prize for Physics in 1930 for the discovery of Raman Effect.
- The Nobel Prize for Physics was not conferred in six years; 1916, 1931, 1934, 1940, 1941 and 1942 due to the world wars.
What is Black Hole?
As claimed by NASA, a black hole is a place in space where gravity pulls so much that even light can not get out. The gravity is so strong because the matter has been squeezed into a tiny space. This can happen when a star is dying.
Because no light can get out, people can’t see black holes. They are invisible. Space telescopes with special tools can help find black holes. The special tools can see how stars that are very close to black holes act differently than other stars.
Wrapping Up
Nobel Prize has been awarded to 9 Indians, with first to Ravindra Nath Tagore in Literature in 1913 and the most recent to Indian-American Abhijit Banerjee in Economics in 2019.
