Читать книгу Nobel - Michael Worek - Страница 7

At the end of the 19th century, Alfred Nobel recognized the pressing need for humanity to develop its medical knowledge, products and procedures. He had himself suffered from ill health for much of his life and experienced the primitive help available at the time. Accordingly, he specified in his will that a prize was to be set aside for this field, and in 1901 the first Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was conferred by the Karolinska Institute. The first winner was the German Emil von Behring, who was distinguished for his “work on serum therapy, especially its application against diphtheria, by which he has opened a new road in the domain of medical science and thereby placed in the hands of the physician a victorious weapon against illness and death.”

The difficult mission of choosing up to three people annually for this prize is still in the hands of the Karolinska Institute, located in Solna, just outside Stockholm. It initially entrusted the selection process of the nominees to its teaching staff, but nowadays the Nobel Assembly of the Karolinska Institute is composed of 50 elected members of the Faculty of Medicine.

The organization continues to train doctors, dentists, physiotherapists, speech therapists and toxicologists. It also maintains a strong academic research department responsible for nearly 40 percent of such work in the country. According to the 2007 Academic Ranking of World Universities, it is the best such department in the country and 11th in Europe. Besides its close ties to the Nobel Foundation, the institute also preserves valuable relationships with the Swedish government and health organizations, businesses and other universities worldwide.