The Most Famous

PHYSICISTS from Japan

This page contains a list of the greatest Japanese Physicists. The pantheon dataset contains 851 Physicists, 18 of which were born in Japan. This makes Japan the birth place of the 9th most number of Physicists behind Netherlands, and Austria.

Top 10

The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the top 10 most legendary Japanese Physicists of all time. This list of famous Japanese Physicists is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity. Visit the rankings page to view the entire list of Japanese Physicists.

1. Isamu Akasaki (1929 - 2021)

With an HPI of 67.68, Isamu Akasaki is the most famous Japanese Physicist. His biography has been translated into 68 different languages on wikipedia.

Isamu Akasaki (赤﨑勇, Akasaki Isamu, January 30, 1929 – April 1, 2021) was a Japanese engineer and physicist, specializing in the field of semiconductor technology and Nobel Prize laureate, best known for inventing the bright gallium nitride (GaN) p-n junction blue LED in 1989 and subsequently the high-brightness GaN blue LED as well. For this and other achievements, Akasaki was awarded the Kyoto Prize in Advanced Technology in 2009, and the IEEE Edison Medal in 2011. He was also awarded the 2014 Nobel prize in Physics, together with Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Nakamura, "for the invention of efficient blue light-emitting diodes, which has enabled bright and energy-saving white light sources". In 2021, Akasaki, along with Shuji Nakamura, Nick Holonyak, M. George Craford and Russell D. Dupuis were awarded the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering "for the creation and development of LED lighting, which forms the basis of all solid state lighting technology".

2. Hideki Yukawa (1907 - 1981)

With an HPI of 66.99, Hideki Yukawa is the 2nd most famous Japanese Physicist. His biography has been translated into 84 different languages.

Hideki Yukawa (Japanese: 湯川秀樹; né Ogawa; 23 January 1907 – 8 September 1981) was a Japanese theoretical physicist who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1949 for his prediction of the meson.

3. Shin'ichirō Tomonaga (1906 - 1979)

With an HPI of 65.52, Shin'ichirō Tomonaga is the 3rd most famous Japanese Physicist. His biography has been translated into 72 different languages.

Shinichiro Tomonaga (朝永振一郎, Tomonaga Shin'ichirō, March 31, 1906 – July 8, 1979), usually cited as Sin-Itiro Tomonaga in English, was a Japanese physicist, influential in the development of quantum electrodynamics, work for which he was jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1965 along with Richard Feynman and Julian Schwinger.

4. Yoichiro Nambu (1921 - 2015)

With an HPI of 63.82, Yoichiro Nambu is the 4th most famous Japanese Physicist. His biography has been translated into 66 different languages.

Yoichiro Nambu (南部陽一郎, Nanbu Yōichirō, 18 January 1921 – 5 July 2015) was a Japanese-American physicist and professor at the University of Chicago. Known for his contributions to the field of theoretical physics, he was awarded half of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2008 for the discovery in 1960 of the mechanism of spontaneous broken symmetry in subatomic physics, related at first to the strong interaction's chiral symmetry and later to the electroweak interaction and Higgs mechanism. The other half was split equally between Makoto Kobayashi and Toshihide Maskawa "for the discovery of the origin of the broken symmetry which predicts the existence of at least three families of quarks in nature."

5. Makoto Kobayashi (b. 1944)

With an HPI of 63.21, Makoto Kobayashi is the 5th most famous Japanese Physicist. His biography has been translated into 61 different languages.

Makoto Kobayashi (小林誠, Kobayashi Makoto, born April 7, 1944, in Nagoya, Japan) is a Japanese physicist known for his work on CP-violation who was awarded one-fourth of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physics "for the discovery of the origin of the broken symmetry which predicts the existence of at least three families of quarks in nature."

6. Masatoshi Koshiba (1926 - 2020)

With an HPI of 62.45, Masatoshi Koshiba is the 6th most famous Japanese Physicist. His biography has been translated into 71 different languages.

Masatoshi Koshiba (小柴昌俊, Koshiba Masatoshi, 19 September 1926 – 12 November 2020) was a Japanese physicist and one of the founders of neutrino astronomy. His work with the neutrino detectors Kamiokande and Super-Kamiokande was instrumental in detecting solar neutrinos, providing experimental evidence for the solar neutrino problem. Koshiba won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2002, jointly with Raymond Davis Jr., "for pioneering contributions to astrophysics, in particular for the detection of cosmic neutrinos". He was a senior counselor at the International Center for Elementary Particle Physics (ICEPP) and professor at the University of Tokyo.

7. Syukuro Manabe (b. 1931)

With an HPI of 62.29, Syukuro Manabe is the 7th most famous Japanese Physicist. His biography has been translated into 45 different languages.

Syukuro "Suki" Manabe (真鍋淑郎, Manabe Shukurō, born 21 September 1931) is a Japanese–American physicist, meteorologist, and climatologist, who pioneered the use of computers to simulate global climate change and natural climate variations. He was awarded the 2021 Nobel Prize in Physics jointly with Klaus Hasselmann and Giorgio Parisi, for his contributions to the physical modeling of Earth's climate, quantifying its variability, and predictions of climate change.

8. Leo Esaki (b. 1925)

With an HPI of 61.61, Leo Esaki is the 8th most famous Japanese Physicist. His biography has been translated into 70 different languages.

Reona Esaki (江崎玲於奈 Esaki Reona, born March 12, 1925), also known as Leo Esaki, is a Japanese physicist who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1973 with Ivar Giaever and Brian David Josephson for his work in electron tunneling in semiconductor materials which finally led to his invention of the Esaki diode, which exploited that phenomenon. This research was done when he was with Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo (now known as Sony). He has also contributed in being a pioneer of the semiconductor superlattices.

9. Toshihide Maskawa (1940 - 2021)

With an HPI of 61.46, Toshihide Maskawa is the 9th most famous Japanese Physicist. His biography has been translated into 62 different languages.

Toshihide Maskawa (or Masukawa) (益川敏英, Masukawa Toshihide, 7 February 1940 – 23 July 2021) was a Japanese theoretical physicist known for his work on CP-violation who was awarded one quarter of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physics "for the discovery of the origin of the broken symmetry which predicts the existence of at least three families of quarks in nature."

10. Shuji Nakamura (b. 1954)

With an HPI of 58.56, Shuji Nakamura is the 10th most famous Japanese Physicist. His biography has been translated into 67 different languages.

Shuji Nakamura (中村修二, Nakamura Shūji, born May 22, 1954) is a Japanese-American electronic engineer and inventor of the blue LED, a major breakthrough in lighting technology. Nakamura specializes in the field of semiconductor technology, and he is a professor of materials science at the College of Engineering of the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). Together with Isamu Akasaki and Hiroshi Amano, Nakamura received the 2014 Nobel Prize for Physics "for the invention of efficient blue light-emitting diodes, which has enabled bright and energy-saving white light sources". In 2015, his input into the commercialization and development of energy-efficient white LED lighting technology was recognized by the Global Energy Prize. In 2021, Nakamura, along with Akasaki, Nick Holonyak, M. George Craford, and Russell D. Dupuis, were awarded the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering "for the creation and development of LED lighting, which forms the basis of all solid-state lighting technology".

People

Pantheon has 20 people classified as Japanese physicists born between 1865 and 1960. Of these 20, 7 (35.00%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living Japanese physicists include Makoto Kobayashi, Syukuro Manabe, and Leo Esaki. The most famous deceased Japanese physicists include Isamu Akasaki, Hideki Yukawa, and Shin'ichirō Tomonaga. As of April 2024, 2 new Japanese physicists have been added to Pantheon including Yoshiaki Arata, and Kazuhiko Nishijima.