The leading candidate for this year’s Nobel Prize in Physics, to be announced today (Tuesday) is 77-year-old Tel Aviv Univ. Emeritus Professor Yakir Aharonov. Thomson Reuters lists him as the leading candidate.

What was his discovery?

In 1953, Aharonov proposed the Aharonov-Bohm Effect, named after him and his Doctorate mentor, David Bohm.     “The most elementary thing in Physics is to predict the future of the particle; the change in the particle’s speed” Aharonov told Ynet. “In order to do so, one must know where the particle is and what forces control it. In classical physics the particle ‘feels’ the forces that are in control of it. “That is to say, in order for the particle to be effected, the forces must exist at the same place as the particle. What we proved is that quantum physics is wrong; a particle moving in a vacuum outside of a magnetic field will still be affected by the magnetic field.”

What led you to the discovery of the Effect? asked a journalist.

“I looked at all the equations everyone was looking at for years, until I suddenly saw something else. As soon as I told Bohm about the idea, we found a physicist that began conducting experiments to prove the theory.” 
    
Innovators often look at something everything else look at — but they see it differently. Humans have 46 chromosomes. It was long believed that number was 48 – until someone took a closer look at the evidence. 

If you want to innovate, look at what everyone is looking at. Try to see it differently. The results may be surprising.
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Postscript: Aharonov did not win. This year’s Physics Nobel was won by three other worthy physicists. The Nobel Committee announced:

Charles K. Kao, who worked at Standard Telecommunications Laboratories in Harlow, U.K., and taught at the Chinese University in Hong Kong, will share the 10 million-kronor ($1.4 million) prize with Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith of Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, New Jersey, the Nobel Assembly said today in Stockholm. Kao will get half of the amount while Boyle and Smith split the remainder. Kao, 75, in 1966 calculated how to transmit light over long distances through optical glass fibers, a breakthrough that means people today can exchange text, music and images around the world within seconds. Three years later, Boyle, 85, and Smith designed the first imaging technology using a digital sensor, leading to the creation of the digital camera.