Diplomas
Nobel laureates receive a Diploma directly from the King of Sweden. Each Diploma is uniquely designed by the prize-awarding institutions for the laureate that receives it. In the case of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, that is the Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institute. Well-known artists and calligraphers from Sweden are commissioned to create it.[24] The Diploma contains a picture and text which states the name of the laureate and a citation as to why they received the prize.[24]
Award money
The amount of prize money fluctuates depending on how much money the Nobel Foundation can award that year, and is awarded in Swedish kronor (SEK).[25] The first award in 1901 was for 150,782 kronor (7,872,648 kronor in 2009 value).[25] In 2009, the prize money totaled 10,000,000 kronor.[25] Due to budget cuts, in 2012, the amount for each Nobel prize was 8 million Swedish Krona, or US$1.1 million.[26] If there are two winners in a particular category, the award grant is divided equally between the recipients. If there are three, the awarding committee has the option of dividing the grant equally, or awarding one-half to one recipient and one-quarter to each of the others.[27]
Ceremony and banquet
The awards are bestowed at a gala ceremony followed by a banquet.[28] The Nobel Banquet is an extravagant affair with the menu, planned months ahead of time, kept secret until the day of the event. The Nobel Foundation chooses the menu after tasting and testing selections submitted by selected chefs of international repute. Currently it is a three course dinner, although it was originally six courses when it began in 1901. Every Nobel Prize winner is allowed to bring up to 16 guests, and Sweden's royal family is always there. Typically the Prime Minister and other members of the government attend as well as representatives of the Nobel family.[29]
Laureates
Main article: List of Nobel laureates in Physiology or Medicine
Nikolaas Tinbergen (left), Konrad Lorenz (right) won (with Karl von Frisch) for their discoveries concerning animal behavior.[30]
The first Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded in 1901 to the German physiologist Emil Adolf von Behring.[31] Behring's discovery of serum therapy in the development of the diphtheria and tetanus vaccines put "in the hands of the physician a victorious weapon against illness and deaths".[32][33] In 1902, the award went to Ronald Ross for his work on malaria, "by which he has shown how it enters the organism and thereby has laid the foundation for successful research on this disease and methods of combating it".[34] He identified the mosquito as the transmitter of malaria, and worked tirelessly on measures to prevent malaria worldwide.[35][36] The 1903 prize was awarded to Niels Ryberg Finsen, the first Danish winner, "in recognition of his contribution to the treatment of diseases, especially lupus vulgaris, with concentrated light radiation, whereby he has opened a new avenue for medical science".[37][38] He died within a year after receiving the prize at the age of 43.[39] Pavlov, whose work Nobel admired and supported, won the prize in 1904 for his work on the physiology of digestion.[40]
Subsequently, those selecting the recipients have exercised wide latitude in determining what falls under the umbrella of Physiology or Medicine. The awarding of the prize in 1973 to Nikolaas Tinbergen, Konrad Lorenz and Karl von Frisch for their observations of animal behavioral patterns could be considered a prize in the behavioral sciences rather than medicine or physiology.[13] Tinbergen expressed surprise in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech at "the unconventional decision of the Nobel Foundation to award this year’s prize ‘for Physiology or Medicine’ to three men who had until recently been regarded as ‘mere animal watchers’".[41]
Laureates have won the Nobel Prize in a wide range of fields that relate to physiology or medicine. As of 2010[update], eight Prizes have been awarded for contributions in the field of signal transduction through G proteins and second messengers. 13 have been awarded for contributions in the field of neurobiology[42] and 13 have been awarded for contributions in Intermediary metabolism.[43] The 100 Nobel Prizes in Physiology or Medicine have been awarded to 195 individuals through 2009.[44][45] Ten women have won the prize: Gerty Cori (1947), Rosalyn Yalow (1977), Barbara McClintock (1983), Rita Levi-Montalcini (1986), Gertrude B. Elion (1988), Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard (1995), Linda B. Buck (2004), Françoise Barré-Sinoussi (2008), Elizabeth H. Blackburn (2009) and Carol W. Greider (2009).[46] Only one woman, Barbara McClintock, has won an unshared prize in this category, for the discovery of genetic transposition.[44][47] Mario Capecchi, Martin Evans and Oliver Smithies won the prize in 2007 for the discovery of a gene targeting procedure (a type of genetic recombination) for introducing homologous recombination in mice, employing embryonic stem cells through the development of the knockout mouse.[48][49] There have been 37 times when the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to a single individual, 31 times when it was shared by two, and 33 times there were three winners (the maximum allowed).
In 2009, the Nobel Prize was awarded to Elizabeth Blackburn, Carol W. Greider and Jack W. Szostak of the United States for discovering the process by which chromosomes are protected by telomeres (regions of repetitive DNA at the ends of chromosomes) and the enzyme telomerase; they shared the prize of 10,000,000 SEK (slightly more than €1 million, or US$1.4 million).[50] Rita Levi-Montalcini, an Italian neurologist, who together with colleague Stanley Cohen, received the 1986 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their discovery of Nerve growth factor (NGF), is the oldest living Nobel Laureate, being over 100 as of June 2010[update].[45]
In 1947, Gerty Cori was the first woman to be awarded the Prize in Physiology or Medicine.