2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry announced

Indian born Scientist shares Nobel in Chemistry with 2 other Scientists.

Nobel prize in chemistry for this year of 2009 has been awarded to Venkatraman Ramakrishnan (MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology Cambridge, United Kingdom-born in India), Thomas A. Steitz (Yale University New Haven, CT, USA; Howard Hughes Medical Institute) and Ada E. Yonath (Weizmann Institute of Science Rehovot, Israel)"for studies of the structure and function of the ribosome". Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm announced in a press conference web-casted live. Three scientists will share the prize equally.


This is the 101st Nobel prize in chemistry since it was started in 1901. It was Alfred Nobel's wish to award to “the person who shall have made the most important chemical discovery or improvement”.

Science is changed a lot since Nobel prize started. Chemistry back in 1900 is different from chemistry now. So the question has raised whether Nobel Prize in chemistry is still relevant to this time? There are some arguments about Nobel given to chemistry. There is an in-depth analysis about this issue in Analytical Chemistry. If you are interested, here is the link. http://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/ac9018457

P.S.: Linus Pauling, a Oregon State University graduate, had received Nobel prize two times. One for chemistry and next for peace. Proud to be at OSU.