|
This years nobel prize in physics goes jointly to the two American scientists John C. Mather from the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA, and to George F. Smoot University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA. The 60 year old John C. Mather earned his Ph.D. in physics from the University of California at Berkeley, CA, USA in 1974. This is the current working place of 1945 born Georg F. Smoot who earned his Ph.D. from the MIT; Cambridge, USA in 1970. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awards their discovery of the blackbody form and anisotropy of the cosmic microwave background.
 This years nobel laureate George F. Smoot
The COBE results provided increased support for the Big Bang scenario for the origin of the Universe, as this is the only scenario that predicts the kind of cosmic microwave background radiation measured by COBE. These measurements also marked the inception of cosmology as a precise science. It was not long before it was followed up, for instance by the WMAP satellite, which yielded even clearer images of the background radiation. Very soon the European Planck satellite will be launched in order to study the radiation in even greater detail.
According to the Big Bang scenario, the cosmic microwave background radiation is a relic of the earliest phase of the Universe. Immediately after the big bang itself, the Universe can be compared to a glowing "body emitting radiation in which the distribution across different wavelengths depends solely on its temperature. The shape of the spectrum of this kind of radiation has a special form known as blackbody radiation. When it was emitted the temperature of the Universe was almost 3,000 degrees Centigrade. Since then, according to the Big Bang scenario, the radiation has gradually cooled as the Universe has expanded. The background radiation we can measure today corresponds to a temperature that is barely 2.7 degrees above absolute zero. The Laureates were able to calculate this temperature thanks to the blackbody spectrum revealed by the COBE measurements.
 This year John Mather shares the Physics Nobel Prize with Georige F. Smoot.
COBE was launched using its own rocket on 18 November 1989. The first results were received after nine minutes of observations: COBE had registered a perfect blackbody spectrum. When the curve was later shown at an astronomy conference the results received a standing ovation.
The success of COBE was the outcome of prodigious team work involving more than 1,000 researchers, engineers and other participants. John Mather coordinated the entire process and also had primary responsibility for the experiment that revealed the blackbody form of the microwave background radiation measured by COBE. George Smoot had main responsibility for measuring the small variations in the temperature of the radiation.
Source: Nobel Prize Organization
|
