Nobel in Physics for Optical Technology

Optical fibers founded first time in 1966 by Charles Kao, a Shanghai scientist, finally received a 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics. The award was received jointly (shared prize) by Willard Boyle and George Smith. His breakthrough is to determine how to transmit light at a distance using a fiber-optic ultra-pure glass. Optical fibers are commonly used in telecommunications systems as well as in lighting, sensors, and optical imaging. These findings increase the coverage to approximately 99 kilometers from the previous only 19 meters.

After further studies of how light of different wavelengths travels through different media, Kao and his colleagues pointed to silicon dioxide as the best material. But silicon dioxide is difficult to work with. A team of researchers at Corning Glass Works realized Kao's designs in 1970, using a high-pressure reaction chamber to form the first low-loss optical fibers, and others at Bell Laboratories refined the manufacturing technique to bring down the cost.

Now, the modern optical fibers are even better than before predicted, because in 1988 the first intercontinental optical fiber, which was 6,000 kilometers, was laid down between Europe and America; today there are over one billion kilometers of optical fiber around the world, with more being added each day where all the telecommunication technology will all adapt to optical fibers.

Picture from http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/archive/4/49/20060528105901!Fibreoptic.jpg