The Nobel Prize laureate Peter Grünberg is dead. He died at age of 78, as research center Jülich reported. Grünberg received 2007 Nobel Prize for discovery of Riesenmagnetowiderstands (GMR) toger with Frenchman Albert Prod. Using GMR, storage capacity of computer hard drives could be greatly increased.
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In 1988, Grünberg and production discovered practically simultaneously and independently of each or Riesenmagnetowiderstand. This effect occurs when two layers of iron are separated by a wafer-thin non-magnetic layer, which is n magnetized. On this basis, sensitive write heads for computer hard disks could be developed and storage capacity of drives increased to gigabytes. Grünberg is thus regarded as founder far of so-called spintronics.
The Forschungszentrum Jülich, where Grünberg worked for more than 45 years, praised him as an “outstanding scientist who set standards worldwide in field of solid state research”. Without Grünberg and its discovery of Riesenmagnetowiderstands, modern computers and smartphones would be inconceivable. “Peter Grünberg was not only an excellent researcher, but above all he was an esteemed and popular colleague,” writes research centre in his communication.
He had hoped to get prize
As institution of first Helmholtz professorship in Jülich, Grünberg was active at research center until his death. He began his career in Jülich at beginning of 1970s as a research assistant at Institute for Solid State Research. In 2007, after his retirement, he received message that he was awarded Nobel Prize: “I was totally overwhelmed, but had secretly hoped to get prize once,” he said.
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As early as 1989, Grünberg was awarded Federal President’s future prize and 2006 with European Commission’s Inventor award. In 2008, city of Jülich appointed him an honorary citizen.
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