Federico Capasso

Federico Capasso (born June 24, 1949 in Rome ) is an Italian-American physicist.

Capasso received his PhD from the University of Rome (La Sapienza) in 1973 , then conducted research in fiber optics at the Fondazione Bordoni in Rome before joining Bell Laboratories in the USA in 1976 . In 1984 he became a Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff and a Fellow in 1997. From 1987 to 2000 he headed the Semiconductor Physics Research Department and from 2000 to 2002 he was Vice President for Research in Physics. From 2003 he was Robert Wallace Professor of Applied Physics at Harvard University .

Capasso is known for developing the quantum cascade laser , the original idea of ​​which came from the Russians Rudolf Kazarinov and Robert Suris (1971).

In 2004 he received the Arthur L. Schawlow Prize for Laser Physics and in 2005 the König Faisal Prize . In 2000 he received the Willis E. Lamb Prize (with Alfred Y. Cho ), in 2004 he received the Edison Medal of the IEEE , in 2010 the Berthold Leibinger Future Prize and also the RW Wood Prize of the Optical Society of America . In 2013 he received the Humboldt Research Award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation .

In 1986 he became a Fellow of the American Physical Society and in 1992 of the American Association for the Advancement of Science . He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences , the National Academy of Engineering , the American Academy of Arts and Sciences , the Academia Europaea and is an honorary member of the Franklin Institute and recipient of their Wetherill Medal. He is an honorary doctor from the University of Bologna . In 2015 he was elected to the Academia Europaea and awarded the Rumford Prize . In 2016 he received the Balzan Prize , in 2018 the Premio Enrico Fermi , and in 2019 the Matteucci Medal .

Capasso holds 50 patents (2009). In 2005 his autobiography Avventure di un designer quantico (Di Renzo Editore) was published.

Web links

• Homepage of his group at Harvard