Nobel nominations analysis reveals factors behind who won in the past

A magnifying glass looking at a computer screen showing the Nobel Prize website

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Study suggests that human influences and organised behaviour played a greater role than numbers of nominations

Friendships, rivalries, nationality and other ‘nonscientific’ factors had a role in deciding winners of the Nobel Prize in chemistry in its first 70 years, a new study finds, while the number of nominations a scientist received had little influence.