Nobel Prize in Physics in 2006 2026-10-18
Awarded in equal shares to John C. Mather and George F. Smoot for discovering the black-body radiation form and anisotropy of the cosmic microwave background.[ref]
The Nobel Prize in Physics 2006 by Nobel Prize Outreach. Individual official 2006 summary: Mather and Smoot one half each; blackbody form and anisotropy of cosmic microwave background radiation.