The Nobel Foundation ( sv, Nobelstiftelsen) is a private institution founded on 29 June 1900 to manage the finances and administration of the Nobel Prizes. The foundation is based on the last will of Alfred Nobel, the inventor of

dynamite Dynamite is an explosive made of nitroglycerin, sorbents (such as powdered shells or clay), and stabilizers. It was invented by the Swedish chemist and engineer Alfred Nobel in Geesthacht, Northern Germany, and patented in 1867. It rapidl ...

. It also holds Nobel Symposia on important breakthroughs in science and topics of cultural or social significance.

History

, born on 21 October 1833 in

Stockholm Stockholm () is the capital and largest city of Sweden as well as the largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people live in the municipality, with 1.6 million in the urban area, and 2.4 million in the metropo ...

Sweden, was a chemist, engineer, innovator, armaments manufacturer and the inventor of

. He owned Bofors, a major armaments manufacturer, which he had redirected from its original business as an iron and steel mill. Nobel held 355 different patents,

being the most famous. Nobel amassed a sizeable personal fortune during his lifetime, thanks mostly to this invention. In 1896 Nobel died of a stroke in his

villa A villa is a type of house that was originally an ancient Roman upper class country house. Since its origins in the Roman villa, the idea and function of a villa have evolved considerably. After the fall of the Roman Republic, villas became ...

in San Remo, Italy where he had lived his final years.AFP
"Alfred Nobel's last will and testament"
, '' The Local''(5 October 2009): accessed 14 January 2009. Nobel's will expressed a request, to the surprise of many, that his money be used for prizes in

physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which ...

chemistry Chemistry is the scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a natural science that covers the elements that make up matter to the compounds made of atoms, molecules and ions: their composition, structure, proper ...

peace Peace is a concept of societal friendship and harmony in the absence of hostility and violence. In a social sense, peace is commonly used to mean a lack of conflict (such as war) and freedom from fear of violence between individuals or groups. ...

physiology Physiology (; ) is the scientific study of functions and mechanisms in a living system. As a sub-discipline of biology, physiology focuses on how organisms, organ systems, individual organs, cells, and biomolecules carry out the chemic ...

or medicine and literature. Though Nobel wrote several wills during his lifetime, the last was written a little over a year before he died, and signed at the Swedish-Norwegian Club in Paris on 27 November 1895. Nobel bequeathed 94% of his total assets, 31 million Swedish ''kronor'', to establish and endow the five Nobel Prizes."The Will of Alfred Nobel"
Nobel Foundation. Retrieved 6 November 2007. (As of 2008 that equates to 186 million US dollars.) Alfred Nobels will-November 25th, 1895

The executors of his will were Ragnar Sohlman and Rudolf Lilljequist who formed the Nobel Foundation to take care of Nobel's fortune and organize the prizes."Nobel Prize
(2007), in ''

Encyclopædia Britannica The (Latin for "British Encyclopædia") is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia. It is published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.; the company has existed since the 18th century, although it has changed ownership various t ...

''. Retrieved 15 January 2009, from ''Encyclopædia Britannica'': Although Nobel's will established the prizes, his plan was incomplete and, because of various other hurdles, it took five years before the Nobel Foundation could be established and the first prizes could be awarded on 10 December 1901 to, among others, Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen. As of 31 December 2020, the assets controlled by the Nobel Foundation amounted to 5.176 billion Swedish ''kronor'' (approx. US$631.61 million as of 31 December 2020)."Financial Management"
'nobelprize.org''. Retrieved 14 July 2021.

The Nobel Foundation

The Nobel Foundation was founded as a private organisation on 29 June 1900 specifically to manage the finances and administration of the Nobel Prizes. It is based on Nobel's last will and testament. At the time Nobel's will led to much skepticism and criticism and thus it was not until 26 April 1897 that his will was approved by the

Storting The Storting ( no, Stortinget ) (lit. the Great Thing) is the supreme legislature of Norway, established in 1814 by the Constitution of Norway. It is located in Oslo. The unicameral parliament has 169 members and is elected every four years ...

. Soon thereafter they appointed the members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee that was to award the

Peace Prize This list of peace prizes is an index to articles on notable prizes awarded for contributions towards achieving or maintaining peace. The list is organized by region and country of the sponsoring organization, but many of the prizes are open to pe ...

. Shortly after, the other prize-awarding organizations followed; Karolinska Institutet on 7 June, the Swedish Academy on 9 June and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on 11 June. The next thing the Nobel Foundation did was to try to agree on guidelines for how the Nobel Prize should be awarded. In 1900 the Nobel Foundation's newly created

statute A statute is a formal written enactment of a legislative authority that governs the legal entities of a city, state, or country by way of consent. Typically, statutes command or prohibit something, or declare policy. Statutes are rules made by ...

s were promulgated by King Oscar II. In 1905 the

Union between Sweden and Norway Sweden and Norway or Sweden–Norway ( sv, Svensk-norska unionen; no, Den svensk-norske union(en)), officially the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway, and known as the United Kingdoms, was a personal union of the separate kingdoms of Swede ...

was dissolved which meant the responsibility for awarding Nobel Prizes was split between the two countries. Norway's

Nobel Committee A Nobel Committee is a working body responsible for most of the work involved in selecting Nobel Prize laureates. There are five Nobel Committees, one for each Nobel Prize. Four of these committees (for prizes in physics, chemistry, physio ...

became the awarder of the

while Sweden became the awarder of the other prizes. In accordance with Nobel's will, the primary task of the Nobel Foundation is to manage the fortune Nobel left after him in a fund. Another important task of the Nobel Foundation is to represent the Nobel Prize to the outside world and to take charge of informal activities and issues related to the awarding of the Nobel Prizes. The Nobel Foundation is not involved in any way in the process of selecting the Nobel laureates. In many ways the Nobel Foundation is similar to an

investment company An investment company is a financial institution principally engaged in holding, managing and investing securities. These companies in the United States are regulated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and must be registered under t ...

in that it invests money in various ways to create a solid funding base for the prize and the administrative activities. The Nobel Foundation is exempt from all taxes in Sweden (since 1946) and from investment taxes in the United States (since 1953). Since the 1980s the foundation's investments began to earn more money than previously. At the beginning of the 1980s the award money was 1 million SEK but in 2008 the award money had increased to 10 million SEK. According to the

s the foundation should consist of a Board with its seat in

. It should consist of five men. The

Chairman of the board The chairperson, also chairman, chairwoman or chair, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the group ...

should be appointed by the King in Council. The other four members should be appointed by the

trustee Trustee (or the holding of a trusteeship) is a legal term which, in its broadest sense, is a synonym for anyone in a position of trust and so can refer to any individual who holds property, authority, or a position of trust or responsibility to ...

s of the prize-awarding institutions. The Board's first task was to choose an executive director from among the

board members A board of directors (commonly referred simply as the board) is an executive committee that jointly supervise the activities of an organization, which can be either a for-profit or a nonprofit organization such as a business, nonprofit organiza ...

. A deputy director should be appointed by the King in Council and two deputies for the other members were appointed by the

Trustee Trustee (or the holding of a trusteeship) is a legal term which, in its broadest sense, is a synonym for anyone in a position of trust and so can refer to any individual who holds property, authority, or a position of trust or responsibility to ...

s. Since 1995 all members of the board have been chosen by the

s and the executive director and the deputy director appointed by the board itself. Apart from the board, the Nobel Foundation is made up by the prize-awarding institutions (the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, the

Nobel Assembly The Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute is a body at Karolinska Institute which awards the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. It is headquartered in the Nobel Forum on the grounds of the Karolinska Institute campus. Originally the Nobel ...

, the

Swedish Academy The Swedish Academy ( sv, Svenska Akademien), founded in 1786 by King Gustav III, is one of the Royal Academies of Sweden. Its 18 members, who are elected for life, comprise the highest Swedish language authority. Outside Scandinavia, it is bes ...

and the Norwegian Nobel Committee), the

s of the prize-awarding institutions and auditors.

Nobel Symposia

In 1965, the foundation initiated the Nobel Symposia, a program that holds symposia "devoted to areas of science where breakthroughs around the world are occurring or deal with other topics of primary cultural or social significance." The symposia has covered topics such as

prostaglandin The prostaglandins (PG) are a group of physiologically active lipid compounds called eicosanoids having diverse hormone-like effects in animals. Prostaglandins have been found in almost every tissue in humans and other animals. They are deriv ...

chemical kinetics Chemical kinetics, also known as reaction kinetics, is the branch of physical chemistry that is concerned with understanding the rates of chemical reactions. It is to be contrasted with chemical thermodynamics, which deals with the direction in ...

diabetes mellitus Diabetes, also known as diabetes mellitus, is a group of metabolic disorders characterized by a high blood sugar level ( hyperglycemia) over a prolonged period of time. Symptoms often include frequent urination, increased thirst and increased ...

string theory In physics, string theory is a theoretical framework in which the point-like particles of particle physics are replaced by one-dimensional objects called strings. String theory describes how these strings propagate through space and intera ...

cosmology Cosmology () is a branch of physics and metaphysics dealing with the nature of the universe. The term ''cosmology'' was first used in English in 1656 in Thomas Blount's ''Glossographia'', and in 1731 taken up in Latin by German philosopher ...

, and the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because t ...

in the 1980s. The Nobel Symposium Committee consists of members from the

s in Chemistry, Literature, Peace, Physics, and Physiology or Medicine; the Prize Committee for Economics; the

Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Because ...

; and the Wallenberg Foundation.

Other Nobel prizes announced by members of the Nobel family

In 2007, the

Nobel Charitable Trust The Nobel Sustainability Trust (NST) is a charity set up by some members of the Swedish Nobel family, i.e. descendants of Ludvig Nobel Ludvig Immanuel Nobel ( ; russian: Лю́двиг Эммануи́лович Нобе́ль, Ljúdvig Emmanu� ...

, founded by

Michael Nobel Michael Nobel ( , ; born 1940) is a Swedish entrepreneur of Russian origin. He is a member of the Nobel family, a descendant of Ludvig Nobel, a former chairman of the Nobel Family Society (1995–2006), a co-founder and chairman of the Nobel S ...

Gustaf Nobel Gustaf Nobel ( , ; born 1950 in Stockholm) is a Swedish businessman and humanitarian, and a member of the Nobel family. He is the Chairman of the Nobel Charitable Trust The Nobel Sustainability Trust (NST) is a charity set up by some members of ...

Peter Nobel Peter may refer to: People * List of people named Peter, a list of people and fictional characters with the given name * Peter (given name) ** Saint Peter (died 60s), apostle of Jesus, leader of the early Christian Church * Peter (surname), a sur ...

, and Philip Nobel, announced their plans to establish a new Nobel prize, the Michael Nobel Energy Award, that will award innovations in alternative energy technology. It will be the first new Nobel prize established by the Nobel family since Alfred Nobel established his prizes. However, it will be awarded by the

and not by the Nobel Foundation, although both are organisations founded by the Nobel family. The plan was announced at nanoTX 07. The Nobel Foundation quickly reacted by threatening legal action for "clear misuse of the reputation and goodwill of the Nobel Prize and the associations of integrity and eminence that has been created over time and through the efforts of the Nobel Committees". The director, Michael Sohlman, of the Nobel Foundation and the elected head of the Nobel family disapproved to the institution of the so-called 'Dr. Michael Nobel Award' as well as the Nobel Charitable Trust (NCT) and Nobel Family Benevolent society.

Notes

External links