Dennis Gabor
Born: 5 June 1900, Budapest, Hungary
Died: 8 February 1979, London, United Kingdom
Affiliation at the time of the award: Imperial College, London, United Kingdom
Prize motivation: "for his invention and development of the holographic method"
Field: optical physics
Prize share: 1/1
During the 19th century photographic methods were developed that resulted in two-dimensional images. In 1951 Dennis Gabor discovered a way of producing images with the illusion of depth. The method was based on interference - interaction between light waves - and coherence - light waves aligned in phase with one another. Light falling on an object is captured on photographic film along with a reference beam that did not fall on the object. When only the reference beam falls on the developed film, the light is bent so that a reproduction with depth is produced.
Dennis Gabor
