Contents
Alain Aspect
Testing quantum entanglement with landmark experiments using photons.
Changing measurement settings · Single-photon experiments
- Born
- 15 June 1947
- Birthplace
- Agen, France
More people
Alain Aspect
Alain Aspect is a French physicist whose experiments helped test whether quantum correlations can be explained by local hidden properties. He shared the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics with John Clauser and Anton Zeilinger.
Early life
Physics studies
Trained at the École Normale Supérieure de Cachan.
Teaching abroad
Taught in Cameroon for three years before returning to research in France.
Career
- 1970s
Quantum foundations
Developed experiments to test Bell inequalities.
- 1981–1982
Photon experiments
Produced influential measurements of entangled light.
- 1980s onwards
Cold atoms
Expanded his research into laser cooling and ultracold matter.
- 2022
Nobel Prize
Shared the Physics Prize for entanglement experiments.
Contributions
Changing measurement settings
Tested entangled photons with rapidly switched apparatus.
Single-photon experiments
Investigated the particle and wave properties of light.
Anderson localisation
Helped demonstrate localisation of matter waves in an ultracold-atom experiment.
Beyond the lab
Cooking
Enjoys bringing a physicist’s precision to cooking, including carefully controlled temperatures for eggs.
French Academy
Elected to the Académie française in 2025.
Sources & photo credit
Life, career and references ↗Nobel Prize facts ↗Nobel podcast interview ↗Photo: Ecole polytechnique Université Paris-Saclay. CC BY-SA 2.0 · Original image. Cropped and displayed in monochrome.
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