This prize is awarded each year in the two categories of theoretical research and experimental research to “recognized researchers whose recent work has most advanced the field toward the achievement of Feynman’s vision for nanotechnology: molecular manufacturing, the construction of atomically-precise products through the use of molecular machine systems,” as proposed by Richard Feynman, an American Nobel Prize Laureate in the field of physics, and is a prestigious international award in the field of nanotechnology.
Dr. Aono received the 2010 Feynman Prize in the Experimental category “in recognition of his pioneering and continuing work, including research into the manipulation of atoms, the multiprobe STM and AFM, the atomic switch, and single-molecule-level chemical control including ultradense molecular data storage and molecular wiring; and his inspiration of an entire generation of researchers who have made their own ground-breaking contributions to nanotechnology.”
Dr. Aono is well-known worldwide for his original research in the field of surface science, which began in the 1980s. In 1989, he organized the “Aono Atomcraft Project” in the Research Development Corporation of Japan (JRDC), taking advantage of his accumulated achievements up to that time. In this project, he demonstrated through numerous examples that free manipulation of atoms which exist stably at room temperature on the surface of materials is possible using the probe of the scanning tunneling microscope (STM), mainly in work with silicon.
This project is also widely known in other countries as the world’s first nanotechnology research project to be carried out with public funding by a national government. (The Aono Atomcraft Project was launched more than 10 years earlier than the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) in the US, which began in 2000.)
Over the course of approximately 20 years since that time, Dr. Aono has carried out a number of original research projects which led research in nanotechnology, not only in Japan, but at the world level. For example, ACS Nano, which is published by the American Chemical Society (ACS), introduced Dr. Aono as a “Leader in an atomic-scale control and manipulation.”
Dr. Aono is a nanotechnology researcher in whom Japan takes great pride in the world scientific community. The Feynman Prize for 2010 recognizes his many important achievement in this field.
The text of the announcement can be found at:
http://www.foresight.org/about/2010Feynman.html
For more detail, contact:
Masakazu Aono, Director-General
International Center for Materials Nanoarchitectonics (MANA)
National Institute for Materials Science
TEL: +91-29-860-4180
E-Mail： aono.masakazu(at)nims.go.jp
For general inquiry, contact:
Public Relations Office, NIMS
TEL:+81-29-859-2026
FAX:+81-29-859-2017
E-Mail: pr(at)nims.go.jp
