Pakistan's laureates, South Asian and Muslim-world winners, famous Literature and Peace laureates, the 'firsts' and the latest prizes. Select a name for what they won for, who they shared it with, and exam facts.
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Languages & Literature
Pakistan
World & History
The electroweak theory, which unifies the weak nuclear force and the electromagnetic force
First Pakistani to win a Nobel Prize
Her struggle against the suppression of children and young people, and for the right of all children to education
Youngest Nobel laureate ever, at 17
61 of 61 awards
| Year | Laureate | Prize | Country | Awarded for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | Joel Mokyr, Philippe Aghion and Peter Howitt | Economics | USA / France / Canada | Explaining economic growth driven by innovation |
| 2025 | John Clarke, Michel H. Devoret and John M. Martinis | Physics | USA (born in UK, France and USA) | Discovering macroscopic quantum tunnelling and energy quantization in an electric circuit |
| 2025 | László Krasznahorkai | Literature | Hungary | A compelling and visionary body of work that, amid apocalyptic terror, reaffirms the power of art |
| 2025 | Mary E. Brunkow, Fred Ramsdell and Shimon Sakaguchi | Medicine | USA / Japan | Discoveries about peripheral immune tolerance, which stops the immune system from attacking the body |
| 2025 | María Corina Machado | Peace | Venezuela | Promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and working for a peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy |
| 2025 | Omar M. Yaghi | Chemistry | Jordan / USA | The development of metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) |
| 2024 | Han Kang | Literature | South Korea | Intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life |
| 2024 | Nihon Hidankyo | Peace | Japan | Efforts to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons, using survivor testimony to show they must never be used again |
| 2023 | Narges Mohammadi | Peace | Iran | Her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and for human rights and freedom for all |
| 2021 | Abdulrazak Gurnah | Literature | Tanzania / UK | His uncompromising writing on the effects of colonialism and the fate of refugees |
| 2021 | Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov | Peace | Philippines / Russia | Efforts to safeguard freedom of expression, a precondition for democracy and lasting peace |
| 2020 | World Food Programme (WFP) | Peace | Rome, Italy | Efforts to fight hunger and prevent hunger being used as a weapon of war |
| 2019 | Abhijit Banerjee | Economics | India / USA | An experimental approach to reducing global poverty |
| 2019 | Abiy Ahmed | Peace | Ethiopia | Efforts to achieve peace, especially ending the border conflict with Eritrea |
| 2016 | Bob Dylan | Literature | USA | Creating new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition |
| 2015 | Aziz Sancar | Chemistry | Turkey / USA | Mechanistic studies of how cells repair damaged DNA |
| 2014 | Kailash Satyarthi | Peace | India | His struggle against the suppression of children and young people, and for the right of all children to education |
| 2014 | Malala Yousafzai | Peace | Pakistan | Her struggle against the suppression of children and young people, and for the right of all children to education |
| 2013 | Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) | Peace | The Hague, Netherlands | Extensive efforts to eliminate chemical weapons |
| 2012 | European Union | Peace | Europe (Brussels) | Over six decades of advancing peace, reconciliation, democracy and human rights in Europe |
| 2011 | Tawakkol Karman | Peace | Yemen | Non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women's rights to take full part in peace-building |
| 2009 | Barack Obama | Peace | USA | Extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples |
| 2009 | Venkatraman Ramakrishnan | Chemistry | India / UK / USA | Studies of the structure and function of the ribosome |
| 2006 | Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank | Peace | Bangladesh | Efforts to create economic and social development from below, through microcredit |
| 2006 | Orhan Pamuk | Literature | Turkey | Novels that explore his native city, Istanbul, and the clash and blending of cultures |
| 2005 | Mohamed ElBaradei and the IAEA | Peace | Egypt | Efforts to prevent nuclear energy being used for military purposes, and to make its peaceful use as safe as possible |
| 2004 | Wangari Maathai | Peace | Kenya | Her contribution to sustainable development, democracy and peace |
| 2003 | Shirin Ebadi | Peace | Iran | Efforts for democracy and human rights, especially the rights of women and children |
| 2001 | Kofi Annan and the United Nations | Peace | Ghana | Work for a better organized and more peaceful world |
| 1999 | Ahmed Zewail | Chemistry | Egypt / USA | Studies of chemical reactions using femtosecond spectroscopy (femtochemistry) |
| 1998 | Amartya Sen | Economics | India | Contributions to welfare economics, including work on famines, poverty and inequality |
| 1994 | Yasser Arafat | Peace | Palestine | Efforts to create peace in the Middle East (the Oslo Accords) |
| 1993 | Nelson Mandela | Peace | South Africa | Work for the peaceful end of apartheid and for a new democratic South Africa |
| 1993 | Toni Morrison | Literature | USA | Novels of visionary force that bring an essential part of American reality to life |
| 1989 | The 14th Dalai Lama | Peace | Tibet (in exile in India) | Non-violent struggle for the liberation of Tibet |
| 1988 | Naguib Mahfouz | Literature | Egypt | Rich, nuanced Arabic fiction that speaks to all mankind |
| 1983 | Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar | Physics | India / USA | Theoretical studies of the structure and evolution of stars |
| 1982 | Gabriel García Márquez | Literature | Colombia | Novels and stories in which the fantastic and the realistic are combined |
| 1979 | Dr Abdus Salam | Physics | Pakistan | The electroweak theory, which unifies the weak nuclear force and the electromagnetic force |
| 1979 | Mother Teresa | Peace | India (born in Skopje) | Her work in bringing help to suffering humanity |
| 1978 | Anwar Sadat | Peace | Egypt | The Camp David Accords, which led to peace between Egypt and Israel |
| 1973 | Le Duc Tho | Peace | Vietnam | Negotiating the Paris Peace Accords to end the Vietnam War |
| 1969 | Ragnar Frisch and Jan Tinbergen | Economics | Norway / Netherlands | Developing and applying dynamic mathematical models to analyse economic processes (econometrics) |
| 1968 | Har Gobind Khorana | Medicine | India / USA | Interpreting the genetic code and its role in protein synthesis |
| 1964 | Jean-Paul Sartre | Literature | France | Work rich in ideas and filled with the spirit of freedom and the search for truth |
| 1964 | Martin Luther King Jr. | Peace | USA | Non-violent struggle against racial discrimination in the United States |
| 1962 | Francis Crick, James Watson and Maurice Wilkins | Medicine | United Kingdom / USA | Discovering the double-helix molecular structure of DNA |
| 1958 | Boris Pasternak | Literature | Soviet Union | Achievement in modern lyric poetry and in the Russian novel tradition |
| 1957 | Albert Camus | Literature | France (born in Algeria) | Writing that throws light on the problems of the human conscience in our times |
| 1954 | Ernest Hemingway | Literature | USA | Mastery of the art of narrative, most recently shown in The Old Man and the Sea |
| 1954 | Linus Pauling | Chemistry | USA | Research into the nature of the chemical bond |
| 1945 | Alexander Fleming | Medicine | United Kingdom | The discovery of penicillin and its cure for many infectious diseases |
| 1930 | C. V. Raman | Physics | India | Work on the scattering of light and the discovery of the effect named after him (the Raman effect) |
| 1921 | Albert Einstein | Physics | Germany / Switzerland | Services to theoretical physics, especially the discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect |
| 1917 | International Committee of the Red Cross | Peace | Based in Geneva, Switzerland | Caring for wounded soldiers and prisoners of war during the First World War |
| 1913 | Rabindranath Tagore | Literature | India (Bengal) | His sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse, especially Gitanjali, made part of Western literature in his own English translation |
| 1911 | Marie Curie | Chemistry | France (born in Poland) | The discovery of the elements radium and polonium |
| 1907 | Rudyard Kipling | Literature | United Kingdom (born in Bombay) | His power of observation, imagination and remarkable talent for storytelling |
| 1903 | Marie Curie | Physics | France (born in Poland) | Research on radiation (radioactivity) |
| 1901 | Henry Dunant | Peace | Switzerland | Founding the Red Cross movement and starting the Geneva Convention |
| 1901 | Wilhelm Röntgen | Physics | Germany | The discovery of X-rays (Röntgen rays) |