The Nobel Prize for physics is awarded for discoveries in quantum mechanical tunneling

STOCKHOLM — John Clarke, Michel H. Devoret and John M. Martinis won the Nobel Prize in Physics on Tuesday for research into quantum mechanical tunneling.

Clarke conducted his research at the University of California, Berkeley; Martinis at the University of California, Santa Barbara; and Devoret at Yale and also at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

“To put it mildly, it was the surprise of my life,” Clarke told reporters at the announcement by phone after being told of his win.

He paid tribute to the other two laureates, saying that “their contributions are just overwhelming.”

“Our discovery in some ways is the basis of quantum computing. Exactly at this moment where this fits in is not entirely clear to me.”

Speaking from his cellphone, Clarke said: “One of the underlying reasons that cellphones work is because of all this work.”

The Nobel committee said that the laureates’ work provides opportunities to develop “the next generation of quantum technology, including quantum cryptography, quantum computers, and quantum sensors.”

“It is wonderful to be able to celebrate the way that century-old quantum mechanics continually offers new surprises. It is also enormously useful, as quantum mechanics is the foundation of all digital technology,” said Olle Eriksson, Chair of the Nobel Committee for Physics.

It is the 119th time the prize has been awarded. Last year, artificial intelligence pioneers John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton won the physics prize for helping create the building blocks of machine learning.

On Monday, Mary E. Brunkow, Fred Ramsdell and Dr. Shimon Sakaguchi won the Nobel Prize in medicine on Monday for discoveries about how the immune system knows to attack germs and not our bodies.

Nobel announcements continue with the chemistry prize on Wednesday and literature on Thursday. The Nobel Peace Prize will be announced Friday and the Nobel Memorial Prize in economics on Oct. 13.

The award ceremony will be held Dec. 10, the anniversary of the 1896 death of Alfred Nobel, the wealthy Swedish industrialist and the inventor of dynamite who founded the prizes.

The prizes carry priceless prestige and a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor (nearly $1.2 million).