“Establishing attosecond physics is a multilateral and multinational effort”

Following his recognition with the 15th Frontiers of Knowledge Award in Basic Sciences, Ferenc Krausz explains how he has pushed ultrafast laser science to its limits, generating single-cycle pulses that allow real-time observation of electron motion in atoms, molecules, and solids. He highlights that this technology opens the door to applications such as the early detection of cancer and other diseases through the analysis of the blood’s ‘molecular fingerprint,’ as well as driving the development of faster electronic circuits.

The BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in Basic Sciences goes in this fifteenth edition to Anne L’Huillier (Lund University, Sweden), Paul Corkum (University of Ottawa, Canada) and Ferenc Krausz (Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics, Germany), the three pioneers of “attosecond physics” or “attophysics” whose work has made it possible to observe subatomic processes unfolding over the shortest time scale captured by science.