by David M. States During the 1930s, the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Medical Research (KWImF) was one of the most dynamic scientific research laboratories in all of Germany. One of its research directors during this time, Otto Meyerhof, had already won the 1922 Nobel Prize in Physiology. Two others, Richard Kuhn and Walther Bothe, were…

by Jan Lindsten Prologue became an internationally well known biomedical scientist during the first decade of the 20th century. A series of works published in 1910 (“the seven little devils”) attracted special attention because he could demonstrate that “the absorption of oxygen and elimination of carbon dioxide in the lungs take place by diffusion and…

by Kenneth J. Carpenter* Introduction In the course of the 19th century, chemists and physiologists studying the composition of foods and the nutritional requirements of humans and animals found that our diets needed to include the complex nitrogenous compounds called “proteins” (that, with water, form the bulk of our lean tissues), together with fats, starch…

Controversial Psychosurgery Resulted in a Nobel Prize by Bengt Jansson This article was published on 29 October 1998. Summary In 1936, the Portuguese neurologist Egas Moniz introduced a surgical operation, prefrontal leukotomy, which after an initial period came to be used particularly in the treatment of schizophrenia. The operation, later called lobotomy, consisted in incisions…

by Anders Cullhed* What is time? Time is one of the main problems of Western philosophy and literature. Ever since the thinkers of classical Greece tried to understand the swiftness of our seconds, minutes and hours – the impossibility of stepping into the same river twice – the problem of time has haunted our imagination.…

Kenzaburo Oe: Laughing Prophet and Soulful Healer by Michiko Niikuni Wilson This article was published on 26 January 2007. Kenzaburo Oe, Japan’s second Nobel Laureate in Literature, with his insistence on engaging the reader in a provocative dialogue on the human condition, is one of the most impassioned voices of conscience countering the country’s minimalist…

Imre Kertész: A Medium for the Spirit of Auschwitz by Madeleine Gustafsson This article was published on 17 November 2003. Imre Kertész was born in Budapest on November 9, 1929. Not yet fifteen years old, he was deported together with 7,000 other Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz, and thence to Buchenwald, where he was liberated in…

by David M. States* Ludolf von Krehl’s search for colleagues who would integrate the then quite separate disciplines of the natural sciences under the umbrella of biomedical research led him to . Meyerhof’s study of intermediate metabolism involved a mix of physiology, pharmacology, physics and pathology. His already well-known successes with the study of muscle…

by Assar Lindbeck Introduction In conjunction with its tercentenary celebrations in 1968, Sveriges Riksbank (the central bank of Sweden) instituted a new award, “The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel” on the basis of an economic commitment by the bank in perpetuity. The award is given by the Royal Swedish…

by Francis SejerstedChairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, 1991-1999 Alfred Nobel’s will In 1895 Alfred Bernhard Nobel drew up a according to which his wealth was to be devoted to the annual award of five prizes “to those who, during the preceding year, shall have conferred the greatest benefit on mankind.” That three of the…