Quantum physicist Prof. Dr. Immanuel Bloch wins the ZEISS Research Award

Prof. Dr. Immanuel Bloch, who is considered a leading quantum physicist, is to be commended with the ZEISS Research Award for his outstanding research in the field of quantum simulation using ultracold atoms. The company has been recognizing outstanding research in optics and photonics since 1990. The ceremony will take place at the Deutsches Museum in Munich on 26 June 2023. Three young scientists from Germany, Austria and Switzerland will also receive awards. They will receive the Carl Zeiss Award for Young Researchers.

ZEISS is also dedicated to enabling innovation at the limits of technology; not just as an optics company, but as a technology group. Science and research play an important role here. That's why ZEISS wants to commend outstanding research in optics and photonics with the ZEISS Research Award. The Carl Zeiss Research Award was started in 1990. It was succeeded by the ZEISS Research Award in 2016. Many of the 26 award winners have gone on to receive other important distinctions, and four of them have even won the Nobel Prize.

The following criteria are key to the ZEISS Research Award: the candidates have made outstanding achievements in optics or photonics; they should still be actively conducting research and their work offers major potential for gaining further knowledge and enabling practical applications. If these criteria are met, the researchers are put forward to a panel of scientific experts from around the world. Prof. Dr. Jürgen Mlynek from Humboldt University in Berlin is head judge.

The Carl Zeiss Award for Young Researchers is presented as well as the ZEISS Research Award. The Ernst Abbe Fund sponsors this award which is earmarked for young scientists. This year, three talented young people will be recognized: Dr. Simon Baier from the University of Innsbruck, Dr. Arindam Ghosh from Julius Maximilian University in Würzburg and Dr. Dasha Nelidova from the University of Basel. Baier works on quantum mechanics at the Institute for Experimental Physics in Innsbruck. Ghosh is a researcher in biotechnology and biophysics. And Nelidova works in ophthalmology at the Institute of Molecular and Clinical Ophthalmology in Basel. Her research includes a novel method for restoring vision after blindness caused by age-related macular degeneration, the most common cause of blindness in industrialized countries.

The science awards will be presented in a special setting this year. ZEISS has invited guests to come to the Deutsches Museum on 26 June 2023. Around 200 guests from the fields of research, science and technology are expected to attend the award ceremony. It is also being held one day before Laser World of Photonics, the world's leading trade fair and congress for photonic components, systems and applications, which is being held in Munich from 27 to 30 June 2023.

In addition to the presentation of the awards, the highlight of the ZEISS event at the Deutsches Museum will be the keynote speech by the host, and ZEISS President and CEO Dr. Karl Lamprecht, as well as speeches by head judge Prof. Dr. Jürgen Mlynek from Humboldt University Berlin and Prof. Dr. Christine Silberhorn from the Institute for Photonic Quantum Systems (PhoQS) at the University of Paderborn.