This is the Nobel season – come the first week of October, there would be those who know they are on the nominated list, who will be anxiously keeping an ear open for the famous ring!!! There are the prizes for Peace,  Literature and Economics, all of which have had some element of political fine balancing, and the choices have  often led to much public debate. However, the  Science prizes  – Medicine or Physiology, Physics, Chemistry – have evoked less controversy and without question, these are the highest recognition of scientific excellence.

The average age of the Science Nobel recipients, being awarded since 1901,  is in the 50s,(55 for Physics and 58 for Chemistry and Medicine) and women have generally done poorly (11/105 in Medicine, 4 in /106 in Chemistry and 2/108 in Physics) for many obvious reasons. In the first half of the century , women featured only 4…