K. Alexander Muller
The Nobel Prize in Physics 1987
Born: 20 April 1927, Basel, Switzerland
Died: 9 January 2023, Zurich, Switzerland
Affiliation at the time of the award:
IBM Zurich Research Laboratory, Ruschlikon, Switzerland
Prize motivation: “for their important break-through in the discovery of superconductivity in ceramic materials”
Prize share: 1/2
Work
When certain metals are cooled to extremely low temperatures, they become superconductors, conducting electrical current entirely without resistance. However, very low temperatures, just a few degrees above absolute zero, are required for this phenomenon to occur. In 1986 Alex Muller and Georg Bednorz discovered that a material composed of copper oxide with lantanum and barium additives became superconducting at a significantly higher temperature than previously tested materials. This sparked extensive research into similar materials.