
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on Tuesday, 6 October, announced that it has decided to award the 2020 Nobel Prize in Physics with one half to Roger Penrose and the other half jointly to Reinhard Genzel and Andrea Ghezfor “their discoveries about one of the most exotic phenomena in the universe, the black hole.”
Roger Penrose has been awarded the prize “for the discovery that black hole formation is a robust prediction of the general theory of relativity”, the Academy said, while Reinhard Genzel and Andrea Ghez have been awarded “for the discovery of a supermassive compact object at the centre of our galaxy.”
Ghez is just the fourth woman to receive the physics prize since 1901, when the first Nobel prizes were handed out.
“I hope I can inspire other young women into the field. It’s a field that has so many pleasures, and if you are passionate about the science, there’s so much that can be done.”
— The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) October 6, 2020
- Andrea Ghez speaking at today’s press conference where her #NobelPrize in Physics was announced. pic.twitter.com/aVTa5EQqMr