Nobel Prize
The Nobel Prize (pronounced /nobél/, although the plain pronunciation /nóbel/ is widely used; in Swedish, Nobelpriset; in Norwegian, Nobelprisen) is an international prize awarded each year to recognize individuals or institutions that have carried out notable research, discoveries or contributions to humanity in the previous year or in the course of their activities.
The prizes were instituted in 1895 as the last will of Alfred Nobel, a Swedish industrialist, and began to be awarded in 1901 in the categories of Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, Literature and Peace.
In view of the non-existence of the Nobel Prize in Mathematical Sciences, Sophus Lie was the first to propose the creation of the Abel Prize when in 1897 he learned that Alfred Nobel had not intended to create a Mathematics prize; The Abel Prize is awarded by the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters in honor of the Norwegian mathematician after whom it is named. Similarly, in 1933 the Fields Medal was established, whose award was held by the International Medal for Outstanding Discoveries in Mathematics, in honor of John Charles Fields, the Canadian mathematician to whom he owes his name.[citation required]
The International Committee for Historical Sciences created the International Prize for Historical Sciences in 2015.
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences is in charge of naming the winners of the Nobel Prizes in Physics and Chemistry. The Nobel Assembly of the Karolinska Institute selects the winner for Medicine, and the Swedish Academy names the winner that of Literature. All are delivered in a ceremony held every December 10 in Stockholm, Sweden. The Nobel Peace Prize, on the other hand, is chosen by the Norwegian Nobel Committee, and is delivered in the city of Oslo.
Awards are awarded annually. Each laureate person or institution receives a gold medal, a diploma and a sum of money. The latter, determined by the Nobel Foundation, in 2013 amounted to 8 million Swedish crowns, equivalent to about 874,000 euros. The prize cannot be awarded posthumously, unless the winner was named before the winner's death If the prize is shared, the amount of money will be divided among the winners, who may not be more than three people.
From 1968, the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel was also established, managed by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which is commonly and erroneously called the "Nobel Prize in Economics", without being a Nobel Prize.
History
Alfred Nobel's Testament
Alfred Nobel was born on October 21, 1833 in Stockholm, Sweden, into a family of engineers. He was a chemist, engineer, and inventor. In 1894 he bought Bofors, an iron and steel company that he turned into a major arms manufacturer. Nobel was a figure known for making use of nitroglycerin as a precursor to many other smokeless military explosives, especially cordite, and would go on to amass a fortune in his lifetime thanks to his 355 inventions, including dynamite, the most famous.. However, he also carried a sense of guilt for the harm that his inventions could have caused men.
In 1888 Nobel was surprised to read his own obituary, which had been titled "The Merchant of Death is Dead," in a French newspaper. Since it was his brother Ludvig who had actually died, the obituary had been published in error eight years before Alfred Nobel's death.This article puzzled him and made him apprehensive about how he would be remembered, inspiring him to change his will..
Nobel wrote several living wills; the last just over a year before his death, which he signed on November 27, 1895, at the Swedish-Norwegian Club in Paris. To widespread surprise, Nobel's last will specified that his fortune be used to create a series of prizes for those who carry out "the greatest benefit to humanity" in the fields of physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and peace:
All that remains of my fortune will be arranged as follows: the capital, invested in secure values by my testamentaries, will constitute a fund whose interest will be distributed every year in the form of prizes among those who have made the greatest benefit to humanity during the previous year. This interest will be divided into five equal parts, which will be distributed as follows: a part to the person who has made the discovery or the most important invention in the field of physics; a part to the person who has made the most important discovery or improvement in the chemistry; a part to the person who has made the most important discovery in the field of physiology or medicine; an ideal part to the person who has worked the best field of literature. The prizes for physics and chemistry will be awarded by the Swedish Academy of Sciences, the physiology and medicine will be awarded by the Karolinska Institute of Stockholm; the Literature Institute, the Stockholm Academy, and the Peace Defenders, by a committee of five people elected by the Norwegian Storting. It is my express wish that, in awarding these awards, the nationality of the candidates is not taken into consideration, but that those who receive the award are the most worthy, whether Scandinavian or not.Fragment of the will of Alfred Nobel
Alfred Nobel thus bequeathed 94% of his total assets, SEK 31 million, to establish the five prizes. In order to take charge of the fortune and organize the awarding of the prizes, his executors Ragnar Sohlman and Rudolf Lilljequist formed the Nobel Foundation.
Nobel Foundation
The Nobel Foundation was established as a private organization on June 29, 1900; Its function is to manage the finances and the administration of the prizes. According to the will of Alfred Nobel, the primary task of the Foundation is the management of the fortune that he himself bequeathed. Alfred Nobel and his brother Robert were involved in oil deals in Azerbaijan and, according to the Swedish historian E. Bargengren, who accessed the Nobel family archives, the decision to allow the withdrawal of their funds in Baku was key to the prizes could be established.
Another important task carried out by the Nobel Foundation is the international promotion of the prizes and supervising the informal administration related to them. The Foundation is not involved in the laureate selection process, but is somewhat similar to an investment company, investing Alfred Nobel's estate with the aim of creating a solid funding base for the recipients. awards and administrative activities. Since 1946 it has been exempt from all taxes in Sweden and, since 1953, from investment taxes in the United States. Since the 1980s, the Nobel Foundation's investments have generated higher profits and, in 2007, its assets reached the 3,628 million SEK (about $560 million).
First prizes
Once the Nobel Foundation and its guidelines were established, the Nobel committees began gathering nominations for the inaugural prizes and sent a list of preliminary candidates to the institutions that would award the prizes. Originally, the Norwegian Nobel Committee singled out prominent figures such as Jørgen Løvland, Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, and Johannes Steen to lend credibility to the Nobel Peace Prize. It eventually awarded the prize to two leading figures in the growing peace movement of the turn of the centuryXIX: Frédéric Passy, co-founder of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, and Henry Dunant, founder of the International Committee of the Red Cross.
The committee in charge of the Nobel Prize in Physics cited Philipp Lenard's work on cathode rays and the discovery of X-rays by Wilhelm Röntgen, who was eventually selected by the Royal Academy of Sciences. Chemistry prize, in the last decades of the XIX century, chemists had made many significant contributions, so the Academy & "He was primarily faced with simply deciding the order in which these scientists should be awarded the prize." It received 20 nominations, 11 of which were nominations for Jacobus van 't Hoff, who received finally the prize for his contributions to chemical dynamics.
The Swedish Academy chose poet Sully Prudhomme to receive the first Nobel Prize in Literature. A group including 42 Swedish writers, artists and literary critics protested against this decision, expecting Leo Tolstoy to be the laureate. Some, including historian Burton Feldman, have criticized this award as a mediocre poet. Feldman's explanation is that most of the members of the Academy preferred Victorian literature, and that for this reason they selected a Victorian poet. The prize in Physiology or Medicine, meanwhile, went to the physiologist and microbiologist Emil Adolf von Behring, who during the 1890s developed an antitoxin to treat diphtheria, which until then caused thousands of deaths each year.
Wilhelm Röntgen, first Nobel Prize in Physics.
Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff, first Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
Emil Adolf von Behring, first Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
Sully Prudhomme, first Literature Nobel.
Jean Henri Dunant, first Nobel Peace Prize.
Frédéric Passy, first Nobel Peace Prize.
World War II
In 1938 and 1939 the government of Nazi Germany prohibited the awardees Richard Kuhn, Adolf Butenandt and Gerhard Domagk from accepting their awards, although each of them was subsequently able to receive the diploma and medal. Despite the fact that Sweden was a neutral country during World War II, the awards were held irregularly during the war. In 1939, the Nobel Peace Prize was not awarded, and due to the German occupation of Norway, from 1940 to 1942 none of the prizes were awarded. The following year, all but the Nobel Prize for Literature and the Nobel Peace Prize could be awarded.
During the occupation of Norway, three members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee fled into exile. The remaining members escaped persecution by the Nazis when the Nobel Foundation claimed the Committee's building in Oslo was Swedish property, becoming a safe haven for the German military, who were not at war with Sweden. These members continued the work of the Committee, but they did not deliver any prizes. As early as 1944, the Nobel Foundation, together with the three members in exile, ensured that nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize were submitted and that the prize was awarded again.
Prize in Economic Sciences
On the occasion of its third centenary, the Sveriges Riksbank, the Swedish central bank, donated a large sum of money to the Nobel Foundation in 1968 to be used to create a prize in honor of Alfred Nobel, the Prize in Economic Sciences, which was first awarded the following year to Jan Tinbergen and Ragnar Frisch "for having developed and applied dynamic models for the analysis of economic processes". The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has since become the Responsible for selecting the awardees. Although not really a Nobel Prize winner, he is closely identified with these prizes; in fact, the laureates are announced alongside the Nobel Prize winners, and the prize is presented at the Nobel Prize-giving ceremony itself in Sweden. The Nobel Foundation Board of Directors decided that after this addition, the creation of new additional prizes.
Other awards
Prize in Mathematical Sciences
They are not managed by the Nobel, but the most prestigious prizes are the Abel Prize and the Fields Medal, being their equivalents in this discipline. Sophus Lie was the first to propose the creation of the Abel Prize when in 1897 he learned that Alfred Nobel had no intention of creating a Mathematics prize, being awarded by the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters. in honor of the Norwegian mathematician to whom it owes its name. In the same way, given the non-existence of the Nobel Prize in Mathematical Sciences, the Fields Medal was established in 1933, whose award held the International Medal for Outstanding Discoveries in Mathematics, in honor of the Canadian mathematician to whom it owes its name.
Prize in Historical Sciences
Since 2014-2015, the International Committee of Historical Sciences (International International Committee of Historical Sciences / Comité international des sciences historiques), the international association of Historical Sciences founded in Geneva on May 14, 1926, awards the International Prize for History of the CICH, Jaeger-LeCoultre, to the "historian who has distinguished himself in the field of History for his works, publications or teaching, and has contributed significantly to the development of historical knowledge". Although not a "Nobel Prize" It is considered the equivalent in Historical Sciences. The CISH Council jury, which has 12 members from different countries, selects the winner from a pool of excellent and highly qualified candidates. Only the collective members of the CISH (its national committees or its international affiliated organizations) can present candidates.
The Medal obtained was made in 2015 by the French engraver Nicolas Salagnac, in a drawing by the Russian artist Yuri Vishnevsky referencing Clio and the face of a watch with the emblem. The first prize went to Serge Gruzinski (School of Higher Studies in Social Sciences and CNRS, Paris, France) awarded on August 26, 2015 at the XXI International Congress of Historical Sciences.
Awards
The statutes of the Nobel Foundation established that the institutions that award the prizes give each winner a gold medal with the image of Alfred Nobel, an accrediting diploma and a financial amount.
Medal
The Nobel Prize medals, minted by Myntverket in Sweden and the Norwegian Mint since 1902, are registered trademarks of the Nobel Foundation.
The medals minted in Sweden (those of the corresponding categories of Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine and Literature) were designed by the sculptor and engraver Erik Lindberg with the same obverse: an image of Alfred Nobel in left profile, accompanied by their dates of birth and death. On the reverse they share the same Latin inscription: Inventas vitam juvat excoluisse per artes(Discovered to help improve knowledge) while the images vary depending on the symbols corresponding to each of the institutions that grant them.
On the other hand, the Peace medal was made by the Norwegian Gustav Vigeland and the one corresponding to the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in memory of Alfred Nobel, by Gunvor Svensson-Lundqvist. Both also have an image of Alfred Nobel on the obverse, but with a slightly different design. On the reverse, the Nobel Peace Medal has the quote Pro ritmo et fraternitate gentium (For rhythm and the brotherhood of nations), while the Economy has no inscription.
For the first edition of the awards, in 1901, the medals could not be delivered on time and instead temporary medals were delivered, also with the effigy of Alfred Nobel, although made of a less valuable metal, until the final medals could be finalized the following year. The delay in the completion of the medals was due to the fact that each of the institutions that award the prizes had to approve the designs of the reverses, something that was not without controversy. Since 1902 all medals have maintained their respective designs.
Until 1980, all medals were minted in 23-carat gold. Since then they have been made in 18-carat green gold overlaid with 24-carat gold. Its weight varies depending on the gold, but each medal weighs an average of 200 grams; and its diameter is 66 millimeters.
Diploma
The laureates receive a diploma directly from the hands of the King of Sweden or, in the case of the Nobel Peace Prize, from the Chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, in the presence of the King of Norway. Each diploma has a design made especially by the institutions that award it, which contains an image and a text specifying the name of the laureate, in addition to usually mentioning the reason or reasons for the award (with the exception of the Nobel Peace Prize, whose diplomas they have never included justification).
Financial amount
At the same time as the diplomas, an important economic prize is awarded, the amount of which depends on the income of the Nobel Foundation for that year. In 2013 it amounted to 10 million Swedish crowns, equivalent to one million euros. The purpose is to avoid the economic concerns of the laureate, so that he can better develop his future jobs, thus promoting the development of culture, science and technology in the world. [citation needed] However, it is not uncommon for recipients to choose to donate the money to scientific, cultural or humanitarian causes.
If in a category, two people share the prize, the sum is divided. If there are three simultaneous winners, the awarding committee can distribute it in three equal parts, or award half to one of the laureates and a quarter to each of the rest.
In September 2020, it was announced that the ceremony would not be in person, for the first time since 1944.
Multiple Laureates
Five people have received the Nobel twice:
- Marie Curie received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1903 in recognition of the extraordinary services given in her joint research on the radiation phenomena discovered by Henri Becquerel and Chemistry in 1911 by the isolation of radio and polonium.
- Linus Pauling won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1954 for his research on the nature of chemical links and that of Peace in 1962 for his activism against terrestrial nuclear tests.
- John Bardeen received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1956 for the invention of the transistor, and again in 1972 for the theory of superconductivity.
- Frederick Sanger obtained Chemistry in 1958 to determine the structure of insulin and also in 1980 for the invention of a method to determine the base sequence of DNA.
- Karl Barry Sharpless obtained the Chemistry in 2001 for the catalytic oxidization of chiral and also in 2022 the chemistry click.
On the other hand, two organizations have received the Nobel Peace Prize on more than one occasion.
- The Red Cross, three times: in 1917 and 1944 for its work during the World Wars, and in 1963 during the year of its centenary.
- The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees received him in 1954 and 1981 for his assistance to refugees.