Physicist J.C. Séamus Davis has been awarded the 2023 Oliver E. Buckley Prize from the American Physical Society. The award, which includes a prize of $20,000, recognizes outstanding theoretical or experimental contributions to condensed matter physics.

In a statement, the award committee said that Davis received the prize for his “innovative applications of scanning tunneling microscopy and spectroscopy to complex quantum states of matter.” The award is shared with Prof. Ali Yazdani of Princeton University.

Davis introduced and established advanced techniques and laboratory requirements allowing use of scanning tunnelling microscopes (STM) to become a general instrument for visualizing electronic states in quantum materials. His high-precision quantitative approach, and the variety of concepts he has introduced and demonstrated, created the prototype for quantum materials research by direct atomic-scale visualization. Quantum microscopes based on Davis designs have galvanized quantum materials visualization studies globally. Direct atomic scale imaging of even the most complex electronic structure in a very wide variety of material classes is now achievable, typically using a combination of instruments, techniques and concepts that he has initiated.

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