Photo: Vogler / CC BY 3.0 (source: Wikimedia Commons)
My Take
David Awschalom sits in a different league of celebrity than most entries here, and I think that is worth saying out loud. As a pioneer of spintronics, manipulating electron spin inside semiconductors, he is one of the people quietly engineering the hardware future of quantum information. The roll call of honors, the Buckley Prize, the Lilienfeld Prize, and a Clarivate Citation Laureate nod often read as a Nobel shortlist, tells you how seriously his peers take him. There is no applause meter for this kind of work, but I would argue it shapes the next century more than most chart-toppers ever will. He has my deepest respect.
Overview
David D. Awschalom (born 1956 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, United States) is an American condensed matter experimental physicist. He is best known for his work in spintronics in semiconductors. Awschalom graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign with a B.Sc. in physics. He received a Ph.D. in experimental physics from Cornell University.
Summary adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
1. Profile
- Name (English)
- David Awschalom
- Name (Japanese)
- デイビッド・オーシャロム
- Reading
- でいびっど・おーしゃろむ
- Born
- October 11, 1956 (age 69)
- Zodiac / Chinese zodiac
- Libra / Monkey
- Origin
- Baton Rouge, Louisiana, United States
- Blood type
- Private
- Height
- Private
- Agency
- Private
- Occupation
- physicist / university teacher / researcher
2. Background
- Elementary school
- Private
- Junior high
- Private
- High school
- Private
- University
- University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Awards & achievements
- 2005 Oliver E. Buckley Condensed Matter Prize
- 1992 Fellow of the American Physical Society
- 2015 Lilienfeld Prize
- 2006 Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
- 2003 IUPAP Magnetism Award and Néel Medal
- 2018 Clarivate Citation Laureates
3. Relationships
- Spouse
- Private
- Children
- Private
- Parents
- Private
- Siblings
- Private
4. Personality
Motto
Private
6. Links
Physicist — see all → · University teacher — see all → · More people from United States →
7. About this entry
Tags
- Last updated
- 2026-06-02
Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public items are marked "Private / Unknown". English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.