Nobel Prize in Physics, 2021 | 06 Oct 2021

Why in News

The 2021 Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded with one half jointly to Syukuro Manabe, Klaus Hasselmann and the other half to Giorgio Parisi “for groundbreaking contributions to our understanding of complex physical systems.”

Key Points

  • About:
    • Manabe and Hasselmann:
      • Awarded for work in physical modelling of Earth’s climate, quantifying variability and reliably predicting global warming.
        • Demonstrated how increases in the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would increase global temperatures, laying the foundations for current climate models.
    • Parisi:
      • Awarded for “the discovery of the interplay of disorder and fluctuations in physical systems from atomic to planetary scales.”
        • He “built a deep physical and mathematical model” that made it possible to understand complex systems in fields such as mathematics, biology, neuroscience and machine learning.

  • Climate Science and Nobel Prize Recognition:
    • The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) had won the Peace Nobel in 2007, an acknowledgement of its efforts in creating awareness for the fight against climate change.
    • A Chemistry Nobel to Paul Crutzen in 1995, for his work on the ozone layer, is considered the only other time someone from atmospheric sciences has won this honour.

Source: IE