Post date: Dec 10, 2013 11:36:50 PM
The laureates in physics, chemistry, economic sciences, medicine and literature receive their Nobel Prizes at a royal ceremony in Stockholm.
STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN (DECEMBER 10, 2013) (NOBEL MEDIA) - This year's Nobel prize winners in physics, chemistry, economic sciences, medicine and literature were awarded their prizes at a royal ceremony in theStockholm Concert Hall on Tuesday (December 10).
While the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded in Oslo, the other Nobel prizes are handed out in Stockholm on the same day, December 10, the date dynamite inventor Alfred Nobel died.The winners received their awards from Swedish King Carl XVI Gustaf.
Canadian author Alice Munro, who won the prize for literature, did not attend the awards ceremony because of ill health. Her daughter, Jenny Munro collected the prize in Sweden.
But the other 11 laureates were there to pick up their prizes, worth 8 million crowns (1.25 million United States dollars).
Britain's Peter Higgs and Belgium's Francois Englert won the physics prize for predicting the existence of the Higgs boson - the particle key to explaining why elementary matter has mass.
Three United States (U.S.) scientists - Martin Karplus, Michael Levitt and Arieh Warshel - shared the chemistry prize for laying the foundations for development of computers to understand complex chemical processes from the purification of exhaust fumes to photosynthesis.
The economics Nobel prize was also won by three Americans - Robert Shiller,Eugene Fama and Lars Peter Hansen for their research that has improved the forecasting of asset prices in the long term and helped the emergence of index funds in stock markets.
Another two Americans, James Rothman and Randy Schekman, together with German-born Thomas Suedhof, received the Nobel medicine prize for plotting how cells transfer vital materials such as hormones and brain chemicals to other cells, giving insight into diseases such as Alzheimer's, autism and diabetes.
Crown Princess Victoria and Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt did not attend the ceremony as they were in South Africa attending the official memorial service forNelson Mandela, who died last week.
The ceremony will be followed by a banquet at the City Hall.