Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics
The Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics is awarded by the Fundamental Physics Prize Foundation, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to awarding physicists involved in fundamental research. The foundation was founded in July 2012 by Russian physicist and internet entrepreneur Yuri Milner.
, this prize is the most lucrative academic prize in the world and is more than twice the amount given to the Nobel Prize awardees. This prize is also dubbed by the media as the "XXI Century Nobel".
Nominations and awards money
, anyone can nominate a candidate through the Fundamental Physics Prize website., each award is worth $3 million. The monetary value exceeds that of the prestigious Nobel Prize, which in 2012 stood at slightly more than $1.2 million.Physics Frontiers Prize laureates who do not go on to be awarded the Fundamental Physics Prize each receive $300,000 and are automatically re-nominated for the Fundamental Physics Prize each year for the next 5 years.
Special Breakthrough Prize
Unlike the annual Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics, the Special Prize is not limited to recent discoveries. As of 2020 the Special Prize, which "can be awarded at any time in recognition of an extraordinary scientific achievement", has been awarded on 5 occasions. The monetary value of the award is also $3 million.Laureates
The following is a listing of the laureates, by year.| Year of award | Fundamental Physics Prize laureates | Awarded for | Alma mater | Institutional affiliation when prize awarded |
| 2012 | Nima Arkani-Hamed | Original approaches to outstanding problems in particle physics | University of Toronto, University of California, Berkeley | Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton |
| 2012 | Alan Guth | Invention of inflationary cosmology, and for contributions to the theory for the generation of cosmological density fluctuations arising from quantum fluctuations | Massachusetts Institute of Technology | Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge |
| 2012 | Alexei Kitaev | For robust quantum memories and fault-tolerant quantum computation using topological quantum phases with anyons and unpaired Majorana modes; topological quantum computing. | Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, Landau Institute for Theoretical Physics | California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA Currently at KITP and UCSB, Santa Barbara |
| 2012 | Maxim Kontsevich | Numerous contributions including development of homological mirror symmetry, and the study of wall-crossing phenomena. | University of Bonn Moscow State University | Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques, Bures-sur-Yvette |
| 2012 | Andrei Linde | For development of inflationary cosmology, including the theory of new inflation, eternal chaotic inflation and the theory of inflationary multiverse, and for contributing to the development of vacuum stabilization mechanisms in string theory. | Moscow State University | Stanford University, Stanford |
| 2012 | Juan Maldacena | Contributions to gauge/gravity duality, relating gravitational physics in a spacetime and quantum field theory on the boundary of the spacetime | Universidad Nacional de Cuyo, Instituto Balseiro, Princeton University | Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton |
| 2012 | Nathan Seiberg | Contributions to our understanding of quantum field theory and string theory. | Weizmann Institute of Science, Tel-Aviv University | Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton |
| 2012 | Ashoke Sen | Opening the path to the realization that all string theories are different limits of the same underlying theory. | Presidency College, Kolkata University of Calcutta IIT Kanpur Stony Brook University | Harish-Chandra Research Institute, Allahabad |
| 2012 | Edward Witten | For applications of topology to physics, non-perturbative duality symmetries, models of particle physics derived from string theory, dark matter detection, and the twistor-string approach to particle scattering amplitudes, as well as numerous applications of quantum field theory to mathematics. | Brandeis University University of Wisconsin, Madison Princeton University | Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton |
| 2013 | Stephen Hawking | For his discovery of Hawking radiation from black holes, and his deep contributions to quantum gravity and quantum aspects of the early universe. | ||
| 2013 | Peter Jenni, Fabiola Gianotti, Michel Della Negra, Tejinder Singh Virdee, Guido Tonelli, Joe Incandela and Lyn Evans | For their leadership role in the scientific endeavour that led to the discovery of the new Higgs-like particle by the ATLAS and CMS collaborations at CERN's Large Hadron Collider. | ||
| 2013 | Alexander Polyakov | For his many discoveries in field theory and string theory including the conformal bootstrap, magnetic monopoles, instantons, confinement/de-confinement, the quantization of strings in non-critical dimensions, gauge/string duality and many others. His ideas have dominated the scene in these fields during the past decades. | Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology | Princeton University, Princeton |
| 2014 | Michael Green, John Henry Schwarz | For opening new perspectives on quantum gravity and the unification of forces. | Harvard University, University of California, Berkeley; and Cambridge University, Cambridge, UK | California Institute of Technology and Cambridge University, Cambridge, UK |
| 2015 | Saul Perlmutter and members of the Supernova Cosmology Project; Brian P. Schmidt, Adam Riess and members of the High-Z Supernova Team. | For the most unexpected discovery that the expansion of the universe is accelerating, rather than slowing as had been long assumed. | Harvard, UC Berkeley, University of Arizona, Harvard, and MIT, Harvard, UC Berkeley | University of California, Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory; Australian National University;Johns Hopkins University and Space Telescope Science Institute |
| 2016 | Yifang Wang; Kam-Biu Luk and the Daya Bay Team | For the fundamental discovery and exploration of neutrino oscillations, revealing a new frontier beyond, and possibly far beyond, the standard model of particle physics. | Nanjing University University of Hong Kong, Rutgers University | Chinese Academy of Sciences, University of California, Berkeley |
| 2016 | Atsuto Suzuki and the KamLAND Team | For the fundamental discovery and exploration of neutrino oscillations, revealing a new frontier beyond, and possibly far beyond, the standard model of particle physics. | Iwate Prefectural University, Japan | |
| 2016 | Kōichirō Nishikawa and the K2K / T2K Team | For the fundamental discovery and exploration of neutrino oscillations, revealing a new frontier beyond, and possibly far beyond, the standard model of particle physics. | High Energy Accelerator Research Organization, Japan | |
| 2016 | Arthur B. McDonald and the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory Team | For the fundamental discovery and exploration of neutrino oscillations, revealing a new frontier beyond, and possibly far beyond, the standard model of particle physics. | Dalhousie University, California Institute of Technology | Queen's University, Canada |
| 2016 | Takaaki Kajita; Yōichirō Suzuki and the Super-Kamiokande Team | For the fundamental discovery and exploration of neutrino oscillations, revealing a new frontier beyond, and possibly far beyond, the standard model of particle physics. | Saitama University, University of Tokyo | Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe, University of Tokyo, Japan |
| 2016 | Ronald Drever, Kip Thorne, Rainer Weiss | For the observation of gravitational waves, opening new horizons in astronomy and physics. | ||
| 2016 | Сontributors who are authors of the paper Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger and contributors who also made important contributions to the success of LIGO. | For the observation of gravitational waves, opening new horizons in astronomy and physics. | ||
| 2017 | Joseph Polchinski | For transformative advances in quantum field theory, string theory, and quantum gravity. | University of California, Berkeley | University of California, Santa Barbara |
| 2017 | Andrew Strominger, Cumrun Vafa | For transformative advances in quantum field theory, string theory, and quantum gravity. | Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Princeton University | Harvard University |
| 2018 | Charles L. Bennett | For detailed maps of the early universe that greatly improved our knowledge of the evolution of the cosmos and the fluctuations that seeded the formation of galaxies. | Johns Hopkins University | |
| 2018 | Gary Hinshaw | For detailed maps of the early universe that greatly improved our knowledge of the evolution of the cosmos and the fluctuations that seeded the formation of galaxies. | University of British Columbia | |
| 2018 | Norman Jarosik, Lyman Page Jr., David N. Spergel and the WMAP Science Team | For detailed maps of the early universe that greatly improved our knowledge of the evolution of the cosmos and the fluctuations that seeded the formation of galaxies. | Princeton University | |
| 2018 | Jocelyn Bell Burnell | For fundamental contributions to the discovery of pulsars, and a lifetime of inspiring leadership in the scientific community. | University of Glasgow University of Cambridge | University of Oxford and University of Dundee |
| 2019 | Charles Kane, Eugene Mele | For new ideas about topology and symmetry in physics, leading to the prediction of a new class of materials that conduct electricity only on their surface. | University of Pennsylvania | |
| 2019 | Sergio Ferrara | For the invention of supergravity, in which quantum variables are part of the description of the geometry of spacetime. | CERN, UCLA | |
| 2019 | Daniel Z. Freedman | For the invention of supergravity, in which quantum variables are part of the description of the geometry of spacetime. | Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Stanford University | |
| 2019 | Peter van Nieuwenhuizen | For the invention of supergravity, in which quantum variables are part of the description of the geometry of spacetime. | Stony Brook University | |
| 2020 | The Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration | For the first image of a supermassive black hole, taken by means of an Earth-sized alliance of telescopes. | The EHT Collaboration consists of 13 stakeholder institutes:
|
New Horizons in Physics Prize
The New Horizons in Physics Prize, awarded to promising junior researchers, carries an award of $100,000.| Year of award | New Horizons in Physics Prize laureates | Awarded for | Institutional affiliation when prize awarded |
| 2013 | Niklas Beisert | Development of powerful exact methods to describe a quantum gauge theory and its associated string theory | ETH Zurich |
| 2013 | Davide Gaiotto | Far-reaching new insights about duality, gauge theory, and geometry, and specially for his work linking theories in different dimensions in most unexpected ways | Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics |
| 2013 | Zohar Komargodski | Dynamics of four-dimensional field theories and in particular his proof of the “a-theorem”, which has solved a long-standing problem | Weizmann Institute of Science |
| 2014 | Freddy Cachazo | Uncovering numerous structures underlying scattering amplitudes in gauge theories and gravity | Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics |
| 2014 | Shiraz Minwalla | Pioneering contributions to the study of string theory and quantum field theory; and in particular his work on the connection between the equations of fluid dynamics and Albert Einstein's equations of general relativity | Tata Institute of Fundamental Research |
| 2014 | Developing new techniques in conformal field theory, reviving the conformal bootstrap program for constraining the spectrum of operators and the structure constants in 3D and 4D CFT's | Pierre-and-Marie-Curie University | |
| 2015 | Sean Hartnoll | For applying holographic methods to obtain remarkable new insights into strongly interacting quantum matter. | Stanford University |
| 2015 | Philip C. Schuster and Natalia Toro | For pioneering the “simplified models” framework for new physics searches at the Large Hadron Collider, as well as spearheading new experimental searches for dark sectors using high-intensity electron beams. | Perimeter Institute |
| 2015 | Horacio Casini | For fundamental ideas about entropy in quantum field theory and quantum gravity. | CONICET |
| 2015 | Marina Huerta | For fundamental ideas about entropy in quantum field theory and quantum gravity. | Universidad Nacional de Cuyo |
| 2015 | Shinsei Ryu | For fundamental ideas about entropy in quantum field theory and quantum gravity. | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
| 2015 | Tadashi Takayanagi | For fundamental ideas about entropy in quantum field theory and quantum gravity. | Kyoto University |
| 2016 | B. Andrei Bernevig | For outstanding contributions to condensed matter physics, especially involving the use of topology to understand new states of matter. | Princeton University |
| 2016 | Xiao-Liang Qi | For outstanding contributions to condensed matter physics, especially involving the use of topology to understand new states of matter. | Stanford University |
| 2016 | Raphael Flauger | For outstanding contributions to theoretical cosmology. | The University of Texas at Austin |
| 2016 | Leonardo Senatore | For outstanding contributions to theoretical cosmology. | Stanford University |
| 2016 | Liang Fu | For outstanding contributions to condensed matter physics, especially involving the use of topology to understand new states of matter. | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| 2016 | Yuji Tachikawa | For penetrating and incisive studies of supersymmetric quantum field theories. | University of Tokyo |
| 2017 | Frans Pretorius | For creating the first computer code capable of simulating the inspiral and merger of binary black holes, thereby laying crucial foundations for interpreting the recent observations of gravitational waves; and for opening new directions in numerical relativity. | Princeton University |
| 2017 | Simone Giombi | For imaginative joint work on higher spin gravity and its holographic connection to a new soluble field theory. | Princeton University |
| 2017 | Xi Yin | For imaginative joint work on higher spin gravity and its holographic connection to a new soluble field theory. | Harvard University |
| 2017 | Asimina Arvanitaki | For pioneering a wide range of new experimental probes of fundamental physics. | Perimeter Institute |
| 2017 | Peter W. Graham | For pioneering a wide range of new experimental probes of fundamental physics. | Stanford University |
| 2017 | Surjeet Rajendran | For pioneering a wide range of new experimental probes of fundamental physics. | University of California, Berkeley |
| 2018 | Christopher Hirata | For fundamental contributions to understanding the physics of early galaxy formation and to sharpening and applying the most powerful tools of precision cosmology | Ohio State University |
| 2018 | Douglas Stanford | For profound new insights on quantum chaos and its relation to gravity. | Institute for Advanced Study and Stanford University |
| 2018 | Andrea Young | For the co-invention of van der Waals heterostructures, and for the new quantum Hall phases that he discovered with them. | University of California, Santa Barbara |
| 2019 | Rana Adhikari | For research on present and future ground-based detectors of gravitational waves. | California Institute of Technology |
| 2019 | Lisa Barsotti and Matthew Evans | For research on present and future ground-based detectors of gravitational waves. | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| 2019 | Daniel Harlow | For fundamental insights about quantum information, quantum field theory, and gravity. | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| 2019 | Daniel L. Jafferis | For fundamental insights about quantum information, quantum field theory, and gravity. | Harvard University |
| 2019 | Aron Wall | For fundamental insights about quantum information, quantum field theory, and gravity. | Stanford University |
| 2019 | Brian Metzger | For pioneering predictions of the electromagnetic signal from a neutron star merger, and for leadership in the emerging field of multi-messenger astronomy. | Columbia University |
| 2020 | Xie Chen | For incisive contributions to the understanding of topological states of matter and the relationships between them. | California Institute of Technology |
| 2020 | Lukasz Fidkowski | For incisive contributions to the understanding of topological states of matter and the relationships between them. | University of Washington |
| 2020 | Michael Levin | For incisive contributions to the understanding of topological states of matter and the relationships between them. | University of Chicago |
| 2020 | Max A. Metlitski | For incisive contributions to the understanding of topological states of matter and the relationships between them. | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| 2020 | Jo Dunkley | For the development of novel techniques to extract fundamental physics from astronomical data. | Princeton University |
| 2020 | Samaya Nissanke | For the development of novel techniques to extract fundamental physics from astronomical data. | University of Amsterdam |
| 2020 | Kendrick Smith | For the development of novel techniques to extract fundamental physics from astronomical data. | Perimeter Institute |
| 2020 | Simon Caron-Huot | For profound contributions to the understanding of quantum field theory. | McGill University |
| 2020 | Pedro Vieira | For profound contributions to the understanding of quantum field theory. | Perimeter Institute and ICTP-SAIFR |