Kobayashi, Makoto
Kobayashi, Makoto,
1944–, Japanese physicist, Ph.D. Kyoto Univ., 1972. Kobayashi taught at Kyoto Univ. (1972–79) and the National Laboratory of High Energy Physics, Tsukuba, Japan (1979–97). He has been a professor at the High Energy Accelerator Research Organization, Tsukuba, since 1997. In 2008 Kobayashi shared the Nobel Prize in Physics with Yoichiro NambuNambu, Yoichiro, 1921–2015, Japanese-American physicist, b. Tokyo, D.Sc. Univ. of Tokyo, 1952. He studied at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, with Albert Einstein from 1952–54 and subsequently was a researcher and professor at the Univ.
..... Click the link for more information. and Toshihide MaskawaMaskawa, Toshihide,
1940–, Japanese physicist, Ph.D. Nagoya Univ., 1967. Maskawa was a research associate at Nagoya Univ. from 1967–70 and then joined the faculty at Kyoto Univ., where he was appointed emeritus professor in 2003.
..... Click the link for more information. for his work on quarks (see elementary particleselementary particles,
the most basic physical constituents of the universe. Basic Constituents of Matter
Molecules are built up from the atom, which is the basic unit of any chemical element. The atom in turn is made from the proton, neutron, and electron.
..... Click the link for more information. ). He and Maskawa predicted the existence of at least three families of quarks, the subatomic particles that are the constituents of protons and neutrons, and thereby provided the foundation for the principle of broken symmetry. The quarks Kobayashi and Maskawa predicted in 1972 have since been confirmed experimentally.