Nobel Prize in Physics 2024: J. Hopfield & G. Hinton for discoveries on artificial neural networks

The American John Hopfield, a professor at Princeton University (USA), and the British Geoffrey Hinton, a professor at the University of Toronto (Canada), are awarded the 2024 Nobel Prize in Physics "for foundational discoveries and inventions that enable machine learning with artificial neural networks", announces Hans Ellegren, Secretary General of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, on 08/10/2024.

From the 1980s, they "have used tools from physics to develop methods that are the foundation of today’s powerful machine learning. John Hopfield created an associative memory that can store and reconstruct images and other types of patterns in data. Geoffrey Hinton invented a method that can autonomously find properties in data, and so perform tasks such as identifying specific elements in pictures", states the Royal Academy.

Thus, they "have helped lay the foundation for the machine learning revolution that started around 2010".

"The laureates’ work has already been of the greatest benefit. In physics we use artificial neural networks in a vast range of areas, such as developing new…