Nobel Prize in Chemistry: history and statistics – BBC Russian

Ian Litvinov BBC Russian Service, London

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“… and another part will go to the person who made the most important chemical discovery or invention …”

from the will of Alfred Nobel

Chemicals, may have been the most important for the science of the Nobel. The invention of dynamite, which brought him millions, as well as the organization of the production process, demanding deep chemical knowledge. Chemistry was the second scientific discipline, Nobel said in his will.

• 63 times the prize is awarded to just one person

• 4 women have won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry

• 1 man won twice

• 58 , the average age of the winner at the time of receiving the award

Prize in Chemistry awarded by the Swedish Academy of Sciences.

At the crossroads of Sciences

The Nobel Committee for Chemistry recognizes that it takes a unique position among the natural sciences The fundamentals of chemistry based on the structure of the atom, which is run by physics.

At the same time biology gives chemists the widest field of research, given that living organisms are complex chemical systems.

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Image caption Many studies have received the Nobel Prize in chemistry, one would qualify and how to work in medicine, and how physics research

Thus, as noted by a member of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry Professor Bertil Anderson, “the fact that chemical research flourished in the early XX century, is closely related to fundamental discoveries in physics”.

Chemistry? Physics? Medicine?

The Nobel committee is often faced with the fact that the same candidate receives the nomination and physics, and chemistry, and medicine.

For the first time this problem has arisen already the third year of the Nobel Prize in 1903, when a Swedish scientist Svante Arrhenius was both nominated and prize for physics, and Prize in Chemistry.

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Image caption Nobel Committee could not decide which is the science include work Arrhenius

After a long deliberation the Nobel Committee for Chemistry suggested that Arrhenius noted in both categories, and he would have received half the chemical, physical, and half the premiums. This idea, however, did not like the Nobel Committee for Physics, and chemists have decided to award the Arrhenius in their department.

That’s why today all three committees in the natural sciences hold joint meetings in order to “distribute” candidates among themselves.

The Chairman of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry in 1945, Prof. Vestgren said that, by and large, of what kind of article or that scientists have received the prize, is not so important: “Most of us agree, the most important thing to decide is worthy of whether a work of the Nobel Prize in principle “.

For example, Peter Mitchell received the 1978 Nobel Prize in chemistry for the study of mechanisms for the transfer of biological energy, could just as well receive the award in the field of physiology or medicine.

Science – a family affair

Chemicals was the most “family” in the Nobel science track record. And the most successful of the Nobel family became the Curie family.

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Image caption Marie Curie and her husband Pierre and his daughter Irene. All three have become Nobel laureates

Marie Curie twice became a Nobel laureate: the first time with her husband Pierre in 1903 she received the Prize in physics, the second time – in 1911 – in chemistry. The eldest daughter of Marie and Pierre Irene in 1935 received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with her husband, Frederic Joliot.

The German scholar Hans von Euler-Chelpin became a Nobel laureate in chemistry in 1929, and his son Ulf – won in Physiology or Medicine in 1970.

American biochemist Arthur Kornberg was the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1959 (although with the same success could receive the award, and in chemistry, given that his research concerned the synthesis of DNA and RNA), and his son Roger won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2006.

Chemical geography

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Image caption Most of all Nobel Laureates in Chemistry in the United States

Most of all Nobel prizes in chemistry, scientists have received from the United States – 49. However, most of them became winners after the Second World War. Until 1945, the United States could boast of only 3 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

Chemists from Germany are in second place – 26 laureates. However, the majority of them (14 persons) received the award before the Second World War.

Britain in third place with 25 laureates. It is followed by France (7), Sweden and Switzerland (5), the Netherlands and Canada (3).

forced abandonment

Adolf Hitler banned two scientists, Richard Kuhn and Adolf Butenandt to accept the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1938. However, later they were allowed to take the medals and diplomas, but no prize money.

The downside

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Image caption At the award ceremony the King of Sweden presents the winner of the medal and diploma

The Nobel medal in chemistry and physics are the same. On the reverse side minted allegory of nature in the form of the goddess rising from the clouds. She carried a cornucopia. Her face veil closes, which raises an allegory of science.

An inscription in Latin says: “Inventas vitam juvat excoluisse per artes”. This line is taken from a poem by Virgil’s “Aeneid” and roughly translated goes something like this: “And those who have improved the lives of the world its newfound prowess”.

The medal was created by the Swedish sculptor Erik Lindberg.