In 2008, two physicists got a Nobel Prize for their work inventing a new kind of magnetic field that allowed the iPod to be created. The miniature hard drive that gave the original iPod its storage capacity couldn't have existed without their work. Even today in 2025, iPods with hard drives have more storage than the flash-based MP3 players you can buy.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2007/oct/10/nobel https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/2007/fert/facts/ https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/2007/grunberg/facts/

One of the physicists has sadly passed away in 2018.