Word: mendeleev
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...slighting of scientific greats by Nobel judges has been an issue practically since 1901, the first year the awards were made. In 1905, Zuckerman notes, a Nobel committee ruled against Russian Chemist Dimitri Mendeleev, nominated for his formulation of the periodic law and the table of elements. The committee reasoned that Mendeleev's 1869 work had already been widely accepted as a basic part of chemical knowledge. Thus, because the will of Dynamite Inventor Alfred Nobel limited Nobel Prizes to "recent" discoveries, Mendeleev did not qualify. A Nobel historian later called the Mendeleev decision a regrettable error. More recently...
...Zuckerman, the Avery and Mendeleev cases are only two of many examples of committee actions that will lead to more and more "first-class scientists who are destined not to win a Nobel Prize." In part, she notes, these omissions are inevitable, because the number of scientists worldwide has grown some 30 times, while the number of science-prize recipients each year (seldom more than six) has remained more or less constant...