Nobel Prizes

Among the many pioneers who have been associated with the University of Aberdeen are five Nobel Laureates:

Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1921

Frederick Soddy, Professor of Chemistry at the University of Aberdeen from 1914-1919, for his work on radioactivity and isotopes.

Nobel Prize in Medicine 1923

 Professor J J R Macleod, jointly with Frederick Banting, for the research which led to the development of insulin as a treatment for diabetes.

Nobel Prize in Physics 1937

Sir George Paget Thomson, Professor of Natural Philosophy (Physics) at Aberdeen from 1922-1930, together with the American physicist C J Davisson "for their (independent) experimental discovery of the diffraction of electrons by crystals".

Nobel Peace Prize 1947

Lord Boyd Orr, Director of the Rowett Institute and Professor of Agriculture from 1942 to 1945, in recognition of his contribution to the worldwide fight against hunger.  

Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1952

Richard L M Synge, a biochemist with the Rowett Institute from 1948 to 1967, for the invention of partition chromatography - a technique used in the separation mixtures of similar chemicals that revolutionised analytical chemistry.