Between two stools? Pharmacologists nominated for Nobel prizes in “physiology or medicine” and “chemistry” 1901–1950 with a focus on John Jacob Abel (1857–1938)

Abstract

Since the early stages of its academic professionalization, pharmacology has been an interdisciplinary field strongly influenced by the natural sciences. Using the Nobel Prize as a lens to study the history of pharmacology, this article analyzes nominations of pharmacologists for two Nobel Prize categories, namely “chemistry” and “physiology or medicine” from 1901 to 1950. Who were they? Why were they proposed, and what do the Nobel dossiers say about excellence in pharmacology and research trends? This paper highlights the evaluation of “shortlisted” candidates, i.e., those candidates who were of particular interest for the members of the Nobel Committee in physiology or medicine. We focus on the US scholar John Jacob Abel (1857–1938), repeatedly referred to as the “Founder of American Pharmacology.” Nominated 17 times in both categories, Abel was praised by his nominators for both basic research as well as for his influential positions as editor and his work as chair at Johns Hopkins University. The Abel nominations were evaluated for the Nobel Committee in chemistry by the Swedish professor of chemistry and pharmaceutics Einar Hammarsten (1889–1968), particularly interested in Abel’s work on hormones in the adrenal glands and in the pituitary gland. Eventually, Hammarsten did not view Abel’s work prizeworthy, partly because other scholars had done—according to Hammarsten—more important discoveries in the same fields. In conclusion, analyses of Nobel Prize nominations help us to better understand various meanings of excellence in pharmacology during the twentieth century and beyond.

The Uncertain Role of Nominations for the Nobel Prize in Chemistry†

“…Such relationships have been reported in the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine data. [25,58,59] Perhaps Pierre Laszlo was right when he speculated that the long delay in Woodward's Nobel Prize was the feeling by some influential scientists that Woodward's Pope-like demeanor [60] or that "he was not exactly Snow White" [61] was off-putting. [62] Joseph Berger has written that the reasons the author Chaim Grade did not receive the Nobel Prize in Literature "are often traced by scholars to the painful shortcomings of his tempestuous second marriage."…”

“…[5,14,33,[65][66][67] We also suggest that during the first seven decades of the Nobel Prizes in chemistry, there were some types of 'organized behaviors' by the Nobel Committee for Chemistry along with members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences directing the selection of many of the awards. Whether that behavior was motivated by legitimate and less so professional biases toward or against certain types of science or was influenced by more personal and potentially unethical biases, [5,33,59,65] the answer is likely "yes" to both. [68] Might there have also been informal yet still organized behaviors within the chemical community.…”

Bibliometric development of Naunyn–Schmiedeberg’s Archives of Pharmacology

“…However, the journal will not publish purely computational studies without pharmacological experiments ( https://www.springer.com/journal/210/submission-guidelines?IFA#Instructions%20for%20Authors_Important%20Submission%20Policy , last accessed August 4th, 2022) and not pharmacological studies dealing only with crude biological extracts (Merfort et al 2017 ). Lastly, the journal is aware of its societal and historical responsibility and will welcome papers connecting pharmacology and society (Zehetbauer et al 2022 ; Ellerbeck and Seifert 2022 ) or pharmacology and history (Löffelholz 2011 ; Pohar and Hansson 2021 ; Philippu et al 2022 ). With regret, we noted that pharmacodynamics topics are much less prominently presented in Naunyn–Schmiedeberg’s Archives of Pharmacology than they used to be, but this may also be a result of zeitgeist placing emphasis on applied disease-oriented research which is strongly represented in the journal.…”