Ragnar Frisch - Economics
1969 – Odd Hassel -
Chemistry 1969 – Ivar Giæver - Physics
1973 – Trygve Haavelmo -
Economics 1989
Ivar Giæver - Nobel Prize Winner in Physics 1973
Awarded a Nobel
Prize in physics in 1973 for his work in electrical engineering, Ivar
Giæver returned to Norway years later to take a professorship at the
University of Oslo and address biophysical questions. Ivar Giæver was
born in Bergen 5 April 1929. After working a year at a major Norwegian arms
manufacturer, Giæver studied to become a machine engineer at the
Norwegian Institute of Technology (NTH). He completed his education in 1952 and
emigrated to Canada in 1954.
Soon Giæver was employed with the Canadian division of General Electric, and in 1956 he went to the U.S. for further training with the company.
Starting in 1958, Giæver began working in General Electric’s research department. At the same time, he started studying physics at the Rensselaer Polytechnical Institute, where he earned a Ph.D. in 1964. He was also a professor at Rensselaer when he finally left General Electric in 1988. In recent years Giæver has also had a professorship at the Department of Physics at the University of Oslo.
From 1958 to 1969 Giæver worked on electron tunnelling through extremely thin insulating films between two metals in supraconductive and normal states. For his pioneering work in this field, he received the Nobel Prize in physics in 1973.
Giæver has later worked in biophysics, where he has applied the approaches and methods of physics to solving biological problems.
See also The Nobel Institute.
Unit: Information Department, informasjon@uio.no
Document created: 16.05.2000