Albert Fert (; born 7 March 1938) is a French
physicist
A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate cau ...
and one of the discoverers of
giant magnetoresistance which brought about a breakthrough in
gigabyte
The gigabyte () is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information. The SI prefix, prefix ''giga-, giga'' means 109 in the International System of Units (SI). Therefore, one gigabyte is one billion bytes. The unit symbol for the gigabyte i ...
hard disks. Currently, he is an emeritus professor at
Paris-Saclay University in
Orsay
Orsay () is a Communes of France, commune in the Essonne Departments of France, department in ÃŽle-de-France in northern France. It is located in the southwestern suburbs of Paris, France, from the Kilometre Zero, centre of Paris.
A fortifie ...
, scientific director of a joint laboratory (''
Unité mixte de recherche'') between the
Centre national de la recherche scientifique
The French National Centre for Scientific Research (, , CNRS) is the French state research organisation and is the largest fundamental science agency in Europe.
In 2016, it employed 31,637 staff, including 11,137 tenured researchers, 13,415 eng ...
(National Scientific Research Centre) and
Thales Group, and adjunct professor at
Michigan State University
Michigan State University (Michigan State or MSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan, United States. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State o ...
. He was awarded the 2007
Nobel Prize in Physics
The Nobel Prize in Physics () is an annual award given by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for those who have made the most outstanding contributions to mankind in the field of physics. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the ...
together with
Peter Grünberg.
Biography
In 1962 Albert Fert graduated from the
École Normale Supérieure
École or Ecole may refer to:
* an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by Secondary education in France, secondary education establishments (collège and lycée)
* École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing i ...
in
Paris
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
,
where he attended courses by the physicists
Alfred Kastler and
Jacques Friedel. (As an undergraduate he had strong interests in photography and cinema, and was a great admirer of the work of
Ingmar Bergman
Ernst Ingmar Bergman (14 July 1918 – 30 July 2007) was a Swedish film and theatre director and screenwriter. Widely considered one of the greatest and most influential film directors of all time, his films have been described as "profoun ...
.)
After the École Normale Supérieure, Fert attended the
University of Grenoble
The (, ''Grenoble Alps University'', abbr. UGA) is a Grands établissements, ''grand établissement'' in Grenoble, France. Founded in 1339, it is the third largest university in France with about 60,000 students and over 3,000 researchers.
Es ...
and in 1963 received his Ph.D. (''doctorat de troisième cycle'') from the
University of Paris
The University of Paris (), known Metonymy, metonymically as the Sorbonne (), was the leading university in Paris, France, from 1150 to 1970, except for 1793–1806 during the French Revolution. Emerging around 1150 as a corporation associated wit ...
with a thesis prepared in the fundamental electronic
Orsay Faculty of Sciences and in the physical spectrometry laboratory of the University of Grenoble Faculty of Sciences.
On his return from military service in 1965, Fert became assistant professor at the Orsay Faculty of Sciences of the
University of Paris XI (
Université Paris-Sud). Under the direction of Ian Campbell at the
Laboratory of Solid Physics he prepared for a doctorate Sc.D. (''doctorat des sciences'') in Physical Sciences on the electrical transport properties of
nickel
Nickel is a chemical element; it has symbol Ni and atomic number 28. It is a silvery-white lustrous metal with a slight golden tinge. Nickel is a hard and ductile transition metal. Pure nickel is chemically reactive, but large pieces are slo ...
and
iron
Iron is a chemical element; it has symbol Fe () and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, forming much of Earth's o ...
, which he completed in 1970.
He was named professor in 1976.
Fert worked as research director for the university's
condensed-matter physics laboratory (1970–1995) prior to moving to Unité Mixte de Physique, a laboratory jointly run by the Université Paris-Sud and the technology company
Thales
Thales of Miletus ( ; ; ) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek Pre-Socratic philosophy, pre-Socratic Philosophy, philosopher from Miletus in Ionia, Asia Minor. Thales was one of the Seven Sages of Greece, Seven Sages, founding figure ...
.
In 1988, Albert Fert at Orsay in France, and Peter Gruenberg at Jülich in Germany, simultaneously and independently discovered
giant magnetoresistance (GMR) in magnetic multilayers. This discovery is considered to mark the birth of spintronics,
a new subfield of electronics that exploits not only the electric charge of the electrons but also their magnetism (associated with their intrinsic angular momentum, or spin). Spintronics has already contributed important applications; the introduction of GMR read heads in hard disks has led to a considerable increase in the density of information storage.
Other spintronic properties are exploited in magnetic random access memory (MRAM),
which may soon impact computer and phone technology. In 2007, Fert and Prof. Grünberg jointly received the
Japan Award (300.000 Euro) for their discovery of GMR.
In October 2006, Professor Fert received an honorary doctorate from the Department of Physics of the
University of Kaiserslautern.
Fert has made many contributions to the development of spintronics. Following his 2007 Nobel Prize, he began to explore possible spintronics applications of topological properties at surfaces and interfaces. His most recent works are on the topologically protected magnetic solitons called skyrmions and on the conversion between charge current and spin current by topological insulators.
Honors and awards
*
American Physical Society
The American Physical Society (APS) is a not-for-profit membership organization of professionals in physics and related disciplines, comprising nearly fifty divisions, sections, and other units. Its mission is the advancement and diffusion of ...
's
International Prize for New Materials (1994)
*
Grand prix de physique Jean Ricard of the
French Physical Society (1994)
*
International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP) Magnetism Award (1994)
*
Hewlett-Packard
The Hewlett-Packard Company, commonly shortened to Hewlett-Packard ( ) or HP, was an American multinational information technology company. It was founded by Bill Hewlett and David Packard in 1939 in a one-car garage in Palo Alto, California ...
Europhysics Prize (1997)
*
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
The French National Centre for Scientific Research (, , CNRS) is the French state research organisation and is the largest fundamental science agency in Europe.
In 2016, it employed 31,637 staff, including 11,137 tenured researchers, 13,415 eng ...
Gold Medal (2003)
*
Gutenberg Lecture Award (2006)
*
Wolf Prize in Physics (2006)
*
Japan Prize (2007)
* Elected to the
French Academy of Sciences
The French Academy of Sciences (, ) is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French Scientific method, scientific research. It was at the forefron ...
in 2004
*
Nobel Prize in Physics
The Nobel Prize in Physics () is an annual award given by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for those who have made the most outstanding contributions to mankind in the field of physics. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the ...
(2007)
*
Gay-Lussac Humboldt Award (2014)
References
External links
Unité Mixte de Physique CNRS/Thales official website*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fert, Albert
1938 births
Commanders of the Legion of Honour
École Normale Supérieure alumni
French Nobel laureates
French physicists
Grand Cross of the Ordre national du Mérite
Living people
Members of the French Academy of Sciences
Michigan State University faculty
Nobel laureates in Physics
People from Carcassonne
University of Paris alumni
Wolf Prize in Physics laureates
Paris-Saclay University
Paris-Saclay University people
Paris-Saclay University alumni
Research directors of the French National Centre for Scientific Research