Disk-shrinking technology behind iPod earns Nobel Prize for physics

TWO European scientists won the 2007 Nobel Prize in physics yesterday for a discovery that allowed the iPod to become reality.

The technology lets computers and other digital devices store reams of data on ever-shrinking hard drives.

France’s Albert Fert and German Peter Gruenberg independently discovered a physical effect in 1988 that has led to sensitive tools for reading the information stored on hard disks. That sensitivity lets the electronics industry use smaller and smaller disks.

“The MP3 and iPod industry would not have existed without this discovery,” said Borje Johansson, a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

“You would not have an iPod without this effect.”

The two scientists discovered a phenomenon called giant magnetoresistance. In this effect, weak changes in magnetism generate larger changes in electrical resistance. This is how information stored magnetically on a hard disk can be converted to electrical signals that the computer reads.

Smaller disks mean fainter magnetic signals, so the ability to detect them is key to shrinking hard disks.

The first disk-reading device based on the effect was launched in 1997 “and this soon became the standard technology”, the Nobel committee said.

Phil Schewe, a physicist and spokesman for the American Institute of Physics, said the prize honoured “a terrific combination of great physics and huge practical application. I can hardly think of an application that has a bigger bang than the magnetic hard drive industry”.

Mr Fert, 69, is the scientific director of the Mixed Unit for Physics at CNRS/Thales in Orsay, France, while Mr Gruenberg, 68, is a professor at the Institute of Solid State Research in the west German city of Juelich. They will share the $1.5 million prize (€1.06m).

The Nobel announcement broke a streak of American wins from 2000 to 2006 that saw 20 people awarded the physics prize, of whom 16 were US citizens or did their work at American laboratories.