The Nobel Prize

The Nobel Prize is a set of annual international awards bestowed in several categories by Swedish and Norwegian institutions in recognition of academic, cultural, or scientific advances.

The will of the Swedish chemist, engineer and industrialist Alfred Nobel established the five Nobel prizes in 1895

Sweden is the largest country in Northern Europe. It has a very low population density, with just 22 inhabitants per square kilometre. It ranks highly in quality of life, healthcare and education.

Sweden, Denmark and Norway together form the Scandinavia region of Europe. This region was historically inhabited by Scandinavian tribes and Germanic people such as the Norsemen, Geats and Swedes.

Today, Sweden is a constitutional monarchy under King Carl XVI Gustaf, who is the second-longest reigning monarch in Swedish history.

Every year, the Royal Swedish Academy bestows the Nobel Prize for excellence in Physics, Chemistry and Literature. The award has been named after Alfred Nobel.

Any of six international prizes awarded annually for outstanding work in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature, economics, and the promotion of peace. The Nobel Prizes, first awarded in 1901, are decided by members of Swedish learned societies or, in the case of the peace prize, the Norwegian Parliament.

NOBEL PEACE PRIZE

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali was awarded the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize for “his important work to promote reconciliation, solidarity and social justice”.

When Abiy became Prime Minister in 2018, Ethiopia had been locked in conflict with Eritrea for 20 years. In July that year, he stepped across the border in Eritrea and in cooperation with Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki, worked out the principles of a peace agreement.
Ethiopia is landlocked, while tiny Eritrea is connecting by sea to the Middle East. Through the years of conflict, Ethiopia had depended heavily on Djibouti for access to the Gulf of Aden and onward to the Arabian Sea. The peace deal opened up Eritrean ports for Ethiopian use.
In domestic achievements, he lifted Emergency, granted amnesty to thousands of political prisoners, discontinued media censorship, dismissed leaders suspected of corruption, and increased the influence of women in political and community life.

NOBEL PRIZE 2019 FOR PHYSICS

Three scientists, James Peebles, Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz have won the Nobel Prize 2019 for Physics for their contribution to the understanding of the evolution of the universe and earth’s place in the cosmos.

Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB):

Canadian-American cosmologist James Peebles, 84, won one-half of the Prize for his theoretical work helping us understand how the universe evolved after the Big Bang.
His work is focused largely on Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation, which is electromagnetic radiation left over from the early universe once it had cooled sufficiently following the Big Bang.

Exoplanet:

The other half went to Swiss astronomers Michel Mayor, 77, and Didier Queloz, 53, for their discovery of an exoplanet that challenged preconceived ideas about planets.
Using a spectrograph, ELODIE, they predicted the planet by observing the “Doppler effect” — when the star wobbles as an effect of a planet’s gravity on its observed light.
Today, exoplanets are being discovered very frequently — over 4,000 are known — which is remarkable progress from three decades ago, when not even one exoplanet was known.

NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

Austria’s Peter Handke won the 2019 Nobel Prize for Literature, and the postponed 2018 award went to Polish author Olga Tokarczuk.

Austria’s Peter Handke won the 2019 prize for “for an influential work that with linguistic ingenuity has explored the periphery and the specificity of human experience,” the Academy said in a statement.
Polish author Olga Tokarczuk won the 2018 prize – delayed by one year after a sexual assault scandal rocked the award-giving Academy – for “a narrative imagination that with encyclopaedic passion represents the crossing of boundaries as a form of life.”
Olga Tokarczuk, the 15th woman to win the Nobel Literature Prize, also won the International Booker Prize in 2018.

NOBEL PRIZE IN CHEMISTRY 2019

The 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry are awarded to John B Goodenough of the University of Texas; M Stanley Whittingham of the State University of New York at Binghamton; and Akira Yoshino of Asahi Kasei Corporation and Meijo University in Japan.

The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2019 rewards the development of the lithium-ion battery, which “laid the foundation of a wireless, fossil fuel-free society.”
The lithium-ion battery is a lightweight, rechargeable and powerful battery that is now used in everything from mobile phones to laptops and electric vehicles. It can also store significant amounts of energy from solar and wind power, making possible a fossil fuel-free society.
The foundation of the lithium-ion battery was laid during the oil crisis of the 1970s.
- M Stanley Whittingham, discovered an energy-rich material called titanium disulphide, which he used to make a cathode – the positive terminal – in a lithium battery.
- Sony released the first commercial lithium-ion batteries in 1991, based on Yoshino’s configuration.

2019 NOBEL PRIZE IN MEDICINE

Two Americans and a British scientist have been awarded the 2019 Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine for discovering how the body’s cells sense and react to oxygen levels, work that has paved the way for new strategies to fight anemia, cancer and other diseases.

The 2019 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine has been awarded to scientists William G Kaelin, Jr, Peter J Ratcliffe and Gregg L Semenza.
They received the award jointly for their discoveries of “how cells sense and adapt to oxygen availability. they established the basis for our understanding of how oxygen levels affect cellular metabolism and physiological function.
Their research has “paved the way for promising new strategies to fight anaemia, cancer and many other diseases.
The three will share the Nobel prize sum of nine million Swedish kronor or about 9 Lakh 14 thousand US dollar. They will receive their prize from King Carl XVI Gustaf at a formal ceremony in Stockholm on December 10.
It is the 110th prize in the category that has been awarded since 1901.

NOBEL PRIZE IN ECONOMICS SCIENCES

Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer also share the Nobel for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty
The 2019 Nobel Prize for economics goes to Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer “for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty”, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced on Monday.
The research conducted by the 2019 Economic Sciences Laureates has considerably improved our ability to fight global poverty.

In just two decades, their new experiment-based approach has transformed development economics, which is now a flourishing field of research.

Also Read Global Competitiveness Index

Source: The Hindu