Who wins is what matters. This week, Donna Strickland was hailed as the third ever woman to win the Nobel Prize for Physics. Much of the media coverage talked up the historical significance of Strickland’s gender, showing less interest in the substance of her work (research on laser beams). Of course the relative lack of female Nobel Prize winners is newsworthy, and its discussion positive and necessary. But the story illustrates the point that prizes are seen as the ultimate validation of scientific endeavour. Never mind that you have made a life-changing discovery, a public prize is what ultimately wins most adulation, attention and prestige. Commenting on the science Nobel prizes more generally, the Observer’s Science Editor Robin McKie questions their value: “[C]ritics claim the award is now out of step with modern collaborative research methods”. The prizes, he argues, do not reflect the reality of modern scientific cooperation. Worse, perhaps, they create a false public impression of the value of scientific research.

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