French German Duo Won 2007 Nobel prize in Physics
Stockholm, Sweden: France's Albert Fert and German Peter Gruenberg won the 2007 Nobel Prize in physics on Tuesday for their discovery of giant magneto resistance, a process used by billions of people on their computers and digital music players. The technique, also known as GMR, has allowed the computer industry to develop sensitive reading tools for information stored on computer hard drives from tiny laptops to feature rich personal music and video players. "Applications of this phenomenon have revolutionized techniques for retrieving data from hard disks," the prize citation said. "The discovery also plays a major role in various magnetic sensors as well as for the development of a new generation of electronics." It said the discovery can also be considered "one of the first real applications of the promising field of nano technology ," the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said. In 1988, Fert and Gruenberg each independently discovered a total...