This year’s Nobel Prize for chemistry will be announced Wednesday.
Last year, two Americans and a German won the prize for their work on optical microscopy that has opened up our understanding of molecules by allowing us to see how they work close up.
The winners were Eric Betzig, Stefan W. Hell and William E. Moerner.
Since 1901, the committee has handed out the Nobel Prize in chemistry 106 times. In certain years, mainly during World Wars I and II, no prize in chemistry was awarded.
The youngest recipient was Frederic Joliot, who won in 1935 at the age of 35. The oldest chemistry laureate was John B. Fenn, who was 85 when he received the prize in 2002.
Frederic Sanger was the only scientist to win the chemistry prize twice, for his work related to the structure of proteins and DNA.
There is a fine line between the science of chemistry and the fields of physics and biology.
Famed scientist Marie Curie of France, for example, won Nobel honors for her work in radiophysics in 1903 and again in 1911 for discoveries in radiochemistry.
This week, Nobel prizes have already been awarded in medicine and physics.
The committee also will announce prizes in literature, peace and economics in the coming days.
Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel created the prizes in 1895 to honor work in physics, chemistry, literature and peace. The first economics prize was awarded in 1969.