Machine learning pioneers win Nobel prize in physics

Geoffrey Hinton, godfather of AI', and John Hopfield honoured for work on artificial neural networks

Two researchers who helped lay the foundations for modern artificial intelligence - although one later warned of its potential harms - have been awarded the 2024 Nobel prize in physics.

Inspired by the workings of the brain, John Hopfield, a US professor emeritus at Princeton University, and Geoffrey Hinton, a British-Canadian professor emeritus at the University of Toronto, built artificial neural networks that store and retrieve memories like the human brain, and learn from information fed into them.