Civilisation/Nobel Prizes

Introduction

The Nobel Prizes are prizes awarded annually to people (and, in the case of the Peace Prize, to organizations) who have completed outstanding research, invented ground-breaking techniques or equipment, or made an outstanding contribution to society in physics, chemistry, literature, peace, medicine or physiology and economics.

The Prizes were instituted by the Swedish scientist Alfred Nobel through his will. They were first awarded in 1901, five years after Nobel's death. The prize in economics, instituted by the Bank of Sweden, has been awarded since 1969.

Prizes cannot be revoked. Since 1974, no award may be made posthumously.

The Prizes are then awarded at formal ceremonies held annually on December 10, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel's death.

A prize may not be shared among more than three people.

The Peace Prize ceremony has been held at the Norwegian Nobel Institute (1905–1946); the Aula of the University of Oslo (1947–1990); and most recently at the Oslo City Hall. As of 2005, the other Prize ceremonies have been held at the Stockholm Concert Hall.

Since 1902, the King of Sweden has, with the exception of the Peace Prize, presented all the prizes in Stockholm

The Nobel Prize amount is currently set at Swedish kronor (SEK) 11 million per full Nobel Prize

In the history of the Nobel Prize, there have been only four people to have received two Nobel Prizes. These are:

• Marie Curie – Physics (1903) and Chemistry (1911)
• Linus Pauling – Chemistry (1954) and Peace (1962)
• John Bardeen – Physics (1956 and 1972)
• Frederick Sanger – Chemistry (1958 and 1980)
• Barry Sharpless - Chemistry (2001 and 2022)

Frederick Sanger is the only Briton to have received two Nobel Prizes

Only two people have the distinction of being an Oscar winner and a Nobel Laureate –

• George Bernard Shaw, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1925, won an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay in 1938
• Bob Dylan, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2016, won an Oscar for Best Original Song in 2000

Marie Curie shared her Nobel Prize in Physics (1903) with her husband Pierre Curie (and with Henri Becquerel). Her daughter Irène Joliot-Curie and son-in-law, Frédéric Joliot-Curie, would similarly share a Nobel Prize. She was the sole winner of the 1911 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Curie was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, and is the only woman to win in two fields, and the only person to win in multiple sciences

Oldest winner – John Goodenough, for Chemistry in 2019. Aged 97

Youngest winner – Malala Yousafzai. Aged 17

Niels Bohr (Physics, 1922) and his son, Aage (Physics, 1975) won Nobel Prizes

Jan and Niko Tinbergen are the only brothers to win Nobel Prizes

William Bragg and his son, Lawrence Bragg, won the prize for Physics in 1915 for their work on X-ray crystallography’

Husband and wife team, May-Britt and Edvard Moser from Norway, won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2014

Ronald Ross was the first Briton to win a Nobel Prize (Physiology or Medicine, 1902) for his work on malaria

Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin was the first woman after Marie Curie to be awarded alone a Nobel Prize in sciences

Hideki Yukawa was the first Japanese to win a Nobel Prize, in 1949

Andre Geim is the only winner of a Nobel Prize and an Ig Nobel prize (for magnetically levitating a frog)

Alfred Michelson was the first American to receive a Nobel Prize in sciences

First Nobel Prize awarded for astronomical research – Ryle and Hewish (Physics) in 1974

Ernest Walton was the first Irishman to win a Nobel Prize in science

Arnold Sommerfeld was nominated for the Nobel Prize 84 times, more than any other physicist (including Otto Stern, who got nominated 82 times), but he never received the award

The husband of Marie Curie's second daughter, Henry Labouisse, was the director of UNICEF when he accepted the Nobel Peace Prize in 1965 on that organisation's behalf

Only two people have been both Nobel laureate and U.S. Vice President – Charles G. Dawes and Al Gore

People who have declined a Nobel Prize –

• John Paul Sartre (Literature, 1964)
• Le Duc Tho (Peace, 1973)

People who were forced to decline a Nobel Prize –

• Richard Kuhn, Adolf Butenandt and Gerhard Domagk – by Hitler
• Boris Pasternak (Literature, 1958) – by the Soviet Union

Nobel Peace Prize

For a list of winners see List of Nobel Peace Prize laureates

Nobel Prize in Literature

For a list of winners see List of Nobel Prize in Literature laureates

Nobel Prize in Physics

Niels Bohr (1922) and his son, Aage (1975) both won the Nobel Prize in Physics

William Bragg and his son, Lawrence Bragg, won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1915 for their work on X-ray crystallography’. Lawrence was 25 at the time

Swedish physicists Manne Siegbahn and his son Kai both received the Nobel Prize in Physics

JJ Thomson and his son George Paget Thomson both won the Nobel Prize in Physics

First Nobel Prize awarded for astronomical research was won by Martin Ryle and Anthony Hewish in 1974

Only three women have won the Nobel Prize in physics – Marie Curie in 1903, Maria Goeppert Mayer in 1963 and Donna Strickland in 2018

C.V. Raman was the first Asian person to receive a Nobel Prize in any branch of science

Notable winners

1901	Wilhelm Rontgen	for the discovery of X-rays
1903	Antoine Becquerel, Marie Curie and Pierre Curie	for their work on radioactivity
1904	Lord Rayleigh	for the discovery of argon
1906	JJ Thomson	for the discovery of the electron
1907	Alfred Michelson	for The Michelson–Morley experiment which proved that the ether does not exist
1909	Marconi and Braun	for their contributions to the development of wireless telegraphy
1910	Johannes Diderik van der Waals	for his work on the equation of state for gases and liquids
1912	Gustaf Dalen	for the invention of automatic regulators for use in conjunction with gas accumulators for illuminating lighthouses and buoys
1913	Heike Onnes	for his investigations on the properties of matter at low temperatures which led to the production of liquid helium
1914	Max von Laue	for his discovery of the diffraction of X-rays by crystals
1918	Max Planck	for his discovery of energy quanta
1921	Albert Einstein	for his services to Theoretical Physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect
1922	Niels Bohr	for his services in the investigation of the structure of atoms and of the radiation emanating from them
1923	Robert Millikan	for his work on the elementary charge of electricity and on the photoelectric effect
1925	Franck and Hertz	for their discovery of the laws governing the impact of an electron upon an atom
1927	Charles Wilson Arthur Compton	for work on the cloud chamber for discovery of the Compton effect, which demonstrated the particle nature of electromagnetic radiation
1929	Louis de Broglie	for his discovery of the wave nature of electrons
1930	C.V. Raman	for his work on the scattering of light
1932	Werner Heisenberg	for the creation of quantum mechanics
1933	Paul Dirac and Erwin Schrodinger	for the discovery of new productive forms of atomic theory
1935	James Chadwick	for the discovery of the neutron
1936	Carl Anderson Victor Franz Hess	for the discovery of the positron for the discovery of cosmic rays
1938	Enrico Fermi	for his demonstrations of the existence of new radioactive elements produced by neutron irradiation, and for his related discovery of nuclear reactions brought about by slow neutrons
1939	Ernest Lawrence	for the invention of the cyclotron
1945	Wolfgang Pauli	for the discovery of the Exclusion Principle
1947	Edward Appleton	for his investigations of the physics of the upper atmosphere especially for the discovery of the Appleton layer
1949	Hideki Yukawa	for his prediction of the existence of mesons on the basis of theoretical work on nuclear forces
1951	Cockcroft and Walton	for splitting the atom
1954	Max Born	for his fundamental research in quantum mechanics
1955	Willis Lamb	for his discoveries concerning the fine structure of the hydrogen spectrum
1956	Bardeen, Brattain and Shockley	for inventing the transistor
1958	Pavel Cherenkov	for the discovery of Cherenkov radiation
1959	Chamberlain and Segre	for their discovery of the antiproton
1960	Donald Glaser	for the invention of the bubble chamber
1962	Lev Landau	for work on superfluidity
1963	Eugene Wigner Johannes Jensen and Maria Goeppert Mayer	for laying the foundation for the theory of symmetries in quantum mechanics for proposing the nuclear shell model of the atomic nucleus
1965	Richard Feynman	for his work on quantum electrodynamics
1966	Lee, Osheroff and Richardson	for the discovery of superfluidity in helium-3
1967	Hans Bethe	for his contributions to the theory of nuclear reactions, especially his discoveries concerning the energy production in stars
1968	Luis Walter Alvarez	for his decisive contributions to elementary particle physics
1969	Murray Gell-Mann	for his contributions and discoveries concerning the classification of elementary particles and their interactions
1971	Dennis Gabor	for his invention and development of the holographic method
1972	Bardeen, Cooper and Schriffer	for the theory of superconductivity
1973	Brian Josephson	for his pioneering theoretical work on superconductivity
1974	Martin Ryle and Anthony Hewish	for their pioneering research in radio astrophysics
1978	Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson	for their discovery of cosmic microwave background radiation
1979	Glashow, Salem and Weinberg	for their contributions to the theory of the unified weak and electromagnetic interaction between elementary particles
1983	Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar	for his theoretical studies of the physical processes of importance to the structure and evolution of the stars
1986	Gerd Binnig, Heinrich Rohrer and Ernst Ruska	for their design of the scanning tunneling microscope (Binnig and Rohrer) and the electron microscope (Ruska)
1995	Martin Perl and Frederick Reines	for the discovery of the tau lepton (Perl) and the neutrino (Reines)
2000	Jack Kilby	for the invention of the integrated circuit
2006	John Mather and George Smoot	for their discovery of the blackbody form and anisotropy of the cosmic microwave background radiation
2010	Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov	for groundbreaking experiments regarding graphene
2011	Perlmutter, Schmidt and Riess	for the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the universe through observations of distant supernovae
2014	Akasaki, Amano and Nakamura	for the invention of efficient blue light-emitting diodes

Nobel Prize in Chemistry

Notable Winners

1901	Jacobus H. van ’t Hoff	for his work on osmotic pressure
1902	Hermann Fischer	for his work on sugar and purine synthesis
1903	Svante Arrhenius	For his electrolytic theory of dissociation
1904	William Ramsay	for his discovery of the inert gaseous elements in air
1905	Adolf von Baeyer	for his work on organic dyes
1906	Henri Moissan	for his work in isolating fluorine from its compounds
1908	Ernest Rutherford	for his investigations into the disintegration of the elements, and the chemistry of radioactive substances
1909	Wilhelm Ostwald	for his work on catalysis
1911	Marie Curie	for the discovery of radium and polonium
1912	Victor Grignard	for the discovery of the Grignard reagent
1918	Fritz Haber	for the synthesis of ammonia from its elements
1921	Frederick Soddy	for his investigations into the origin and nature of isotopes
1935	Frederic Joliet and Irene Joliet-Curie	for their synthesis of new radioactive elements
1944	Otto Hahn	for his discovery of the fission of heavy nuclei
1951	Glenn Seaborg and Edwin McMillan	for discoveries in the chemistry of the transuranium elements
1958	Frederick Sanger	for his work on the structure of proteins, especially that of insulin
1960	Willard Libby	for his method to use carbon-14 for age determination
1961	Melvin Calvin	for his research on the carbon dioxide assimilation in plants
1964	Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin	for the discovery of the structure of vitamin B12
1965	Robert Burns Woodward	for the synthesis natural products including vitamin B12
1980	Frederick Sanger	for the determination of base sequences in nucleic acids
1993	Kary Mullis	for his invention of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method
1995	Crutzen, Molina and Rowland	for their work in atmospheric chemistry, particularly concerning the formation and decomposition of ozone
2020	Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna	for the development of a method for genome editing

Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine

Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine is awarded yearly by the Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute

Husband and wife team Carl and Gerti Cori from Czechoslovakia won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1947. Gerti Cori was first female winner of the prize

Husband and wife team, May-Britt and Edvard Moser from Norway, won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2014

Elizabeth Blackburn became the first Australian woman Nobel laureate in 2009 for her discovery of telomerase

Tu Youyou was the first Chinese woman Nobel laureate

In 2011, Ralph Steinman was awarded the prize; however, unknown to the committee, he had died three days before the announcement

Notable Winners

1901	Emil von Behring	for discovery of a diphtheria antitoxin
1902	Ronald Ross	For his work on the transmission of malaria
1904	Ivan Pavlov	for research pertaining to the digestive system
1905	Robert Koch	for his tuberculosis findings
1906	Camillo Golgi and Santiago Ramon y Cajal	in recognition of their work on the structure of the nervous system
1908	Paul Ehrlich	for work on immunity
1923	Banting and Macleod	for the discovery of insulin. Banting shared the award with Best
1929	Frederick Hopkins	for the discovery of vitamins
1930	Karl Landsteiner	for his discovery of human blood groups
1932	Sherrington and Adrian	for their discoveries regarding the functions of neurons
1933	Thomas Hunt Morgan	for his discoveries concerning the role played by the chromosome in heredity
1936	Otto Loewi and Henry Dale	for their discoveries relating to chemical transmission of nerve impulses
1943	Henrik Dam and Edward Doisy	for the discovery of Vitamin K
1945	Fleming, Chain and Florey	for the discovery of penicillin and its curative effect in various infectious diseases
1948	Paul Muller	for his discovery of the high efficiency of DDT as a contact poison
1949	Antonio Moniz	for his discovery of the therapeutic value of leucotomy (lobotomy) in certain psychoses
1952	Selman Waksman	for his discovery of streptomycin, the first antibiotic effective against tuberculosis
1953	Hans Krebs	for his discovery of the citric acid cycle
1958	George Beadle and Edward Tatum	for their discovery of the role of genes in regulating biochemical events within cells
1960	Peter Medawar and Frank Burnet	for the discovery of acquired immunological tolerance
1962	Crick, Watson, and Wilkins	for discoveries concerning the molecular structure of nucleic acids and its significance for information transfer in living material
1965	Jacques Monod and Francois Jacob	their discoveries concerning genetic control of enzyme and virus synthesis
1973	Niko Tinbergen, Karl von Frisch and Konrad Lorenz	for their discoveries concerning social behaviour patterns in animals
1983	Barbara McClintock	for the discovery of jumping genes
1988	James W Black	for the development of beta-blockers
1993	Richard Roberts and Philip Sharp	for the discovery of split genes
2001	Hunt, Nurse and Brenner	for their discoveries of key regulators of the cell cycle
2003	Peter Mansfield and Paul Lauterbur	for discoveries concerning Magnetic Resonance Imaging
2008	Francoise Barre-Sinoussi and Luc Montagnier	for the discovery of HIV
2010	Robert Edwards	for the development of in vitro fertilization
2015	Tu Youyou	for her discoveries concerning a novel therapy against malaria
2022	Svante Paabo	for his discoveries concerning the genomes of extinct hominins and human evolution

Nobel Prize in Economics

Full name of Nobel Prize in Economics is “Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel”

Nobel Prize in Economics in 2019 awarded to Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, who are the sixth married couple to jointly win a Nobel Prize

Notable Winners

1969	Ragnar Frisch and Jan Tinbergen	for work on econometrics
1970	Paul Samuelson	First American winner
1972	John Hicks	First British winner
1973	Wassily Leontief	Identified the paradox that the U.S. (the most capital-abundant country in the world by any criteria) exported labour-intensive commodities and imported capital-intensive commodities
1974	Friedrich Hayek	for work in the theory of money and economic fluctuations
1976	Milton Friedman
1981	James Tobin
1994	John Nash	Game theory
1998	Amartya Sen	for his contributions to welfare economics
2008	Paul Krugman	for his contributions to New Trade Theory and New Economic Geography
2009	Elinor Ostrom	First woman to win
2017	Richard Thaler	Nudge theory
2019	Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo	Second woman to win
2020	Paul Milgrom and Robert Wilson	for improvements to auction theory and inventions of new auction formats
2022	Ben Bernanke, Douglas Diamond, and Philip Dybvig	for research on banks and financial crises
2023	Claudia Goldin	for advancing understanding of women’s labour market outcomes

Nobel Prize Winners in 2024

Peace	Nihon Hidankyo (Japan)
Literature	Han Kang (South Korea)
Physics	John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton "for foundational discoveries and inventions that enable machine learning with artificial neural networks”
Chemistry	David Baker “for computational protein design” and Demis Hassabis and John Jumper “for protein structure prediction”
Physiology or Medicine	Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun "for the discovery of microRNA and its role in post-transcriptional gene regulation"
Economics	Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson, and James A. Robinson "for studies of how institutions are formed and affect prosperity"