Physicists win Europhysics Prize for altermagnetism discovery

Physicists Professor Jairo Sinova, Dr. Libor Šmejkal, and Professor Tomas Jungwirth have been awarded the 2026 Europhysics Prize for identifying altermagnetism, a third distinct category of collinear magnetism.

For over a century, magnetic materials were classified into two primary groups: ferromagnets, which possess aligned magnetic moments and net magnetization, and antiferromagnets, which have cancelling moments and zero net magnetization. Altermagnetism combines traits of both; like antiferromagnets, it has zero net magnetization, but like ferromagnets, its electron distribution allows for strongly polarized electrical currents.

The discovery, resulting from collaboration between Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and the Czech Academy of Sciences, provides a new mechanism for spintronic devices and next-generation computing technologies. The theoretical framework was developed over several years, leading to the identification of hundreds of potential altermagnetic materials.