Benoît Deveaud wins SPS-SFP Prize

Benoît Deveaud. Credit: Alain Herzog (EPFL)

Benoît Deveaud. Credit: Alain Herzog (EPFL)

Physicist Benoît Deveaud, Professor emeritus with EPFL’s Institute of Physics, has been awarded 2019 Charpak-Ritz Prize from the Swiss and French Physical Societies.

The Swiss Physical Society (SPS) exists to “provide all those interested in physics with access to the current state of science and to exchange information with experts.” Since 1991, the SPS has been awarding prizes in various categories, donated by various renowned institutions and companies, to ensure that Switzerland continues to maintain its high level of research quality.

One the SPS awards is the Charpak-Ritz Prize, created and given since 2016 with the Société Française de Physique (SFP) to “highlight the tight relationship between the two societies and to keep the memory alive of Georges Charpak and Walther Ritz who both have profoundly contributed to physics in their respective times”. The prize distinguishes exceptional contributions in physics or in its development, to honor physicists who have made significant contributions in France and Switzerland.

This year the SPS and SFP have awarded the Charpak-Ritz Prize to Benoît Deveaud, now Professor Emeritus with EPFL’s Institute of Physics and Vice-Provost for Research at the École Polytechnique (France). The SPS announcement states that Professor Deveaud “is honored for his "pioneering optical spectroscopy studies dedicated to the ultrafast and quantum optical properties of semiconductor nanostructures.