Image: Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library [CC BY 2.0], via Flickr
Didier Queloz, professor at the Cavendish Laboratory, is one of three laureates this year
The Nobel prize in physics for 2019 has been awarded to three scientists for their contribution to human understanding of “the evolution of the universe and Earth’s place in the cosmos”.
One half was awarded to James Peebles “for theoretical discoveries in physical cosmology”, with the other half given jointly to Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz “for the discovery of an exoplanet orbiting a solar-type star”.
Queloz is based jointly at the University of Geneva and the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge. Peebles is based at Princeton University in the United States and Mayor is also at the University of Geneva.
Queloz became professor at the University of Cambridge in 2013 and is leading a comprehensive research programme with the goal of improving understanding of the formation, structure and habitability of exoplanets.
In 2007, in the emerging area of planetary transit detection, he established an international collaboration with the Wide Angle Search for Planets, developing techniques used to confirm and characterise planetary candidates.
He and Mayor received the BBVA Foundation’s 2011 Frontiers of Knowledge Award in basic science for developing astronomical instruments and experimental techniques that led to the first observation of planets outside the solar system.
“This year’s laureates have transformed our ideas about the cosmos,” the Nobel Foundation said. “While James Peebles’s theoretical discoveries contributed to our understanding of how the universe evolved after the Big Bang, Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz explored our cosmic neighbourhoods on the hunt for unknown planets. Their discoveries have forever changed our conceptions of the world.”
In 1995, Mayor and Queloz announced the first discovery of a planet outside our solar system, an exoplanet orbiting a solar-type star in our galaxy. It is known as planet 51 Pegasi b.
“This discovery started a revolution in astronomy and over 4,000 exoplanets have since been found in the Milky Way,” the foundation said. “Strange new worlds are still being discovered, with an incredible wealth of sizes, forms and orbits. They challenge our preconceived ideas about planetary systems and are forcing scientists to revise their theories of the physical processes behind the origins of planets.”
“With numerous projects planned to start searching for exoplanets, we may eventually find an answer to the eternal question of whether other life is out there.”
“Queloz and Mayor not only discovered the first planet orbiting an ordinary star. They have also been among the leaders in the ongoing research that has led to the discovery of many thousands of other planetary systems, exhibiting an unexpected variety,” said Martin Rees, emeritus professor of cosmology and astrophysics at the University of Cambridge.
“These awards seem to show, incidentally, a welcome broadening of the Nobel criteria,” Rees added. “In the past, astronomy has been included primarily when the discovery involves some new physics…But this award highlights astronomy as also the grandest of the environmental sciences.”
“I am delighted to hear that professor Didier Queloz has been awarded this year’s Nobel prize in physics,” said Stephen Toope, vice-chancellor of the University of Cambridge. “Didier’s discovery of planets beyond our solar system has ushered in a revolutionary new era for cosmology. This work represents an extraordinary scientific achievement but also offers humanity so much inspiration—the chance to imagine such distant and different, or perhaps similar, worlds.”