Awards & Honours Quiz: Science and Technology Awards

The correct answer is B, Council of Scientific and Industrial Research. The prize was instituted in 1958 by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research in memory of Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar, the chemist who served as its first Director-General and built the chain of national laboratories; it is given to Indian scientists below the age of forty-five in seven branches of science and engineering. Option A is wrong because the Indian Space Research Organisation gives its own medals and fellowships in space science and not this prize. Option C is wrong because the Department of Atomic Energy runs the atomic energy establishments founded by Homi Bhabha and does not award this prize. Option D is wrong because the Indian National Science Academy gives honours of its own, such as the Aryabhata Medal for lifetime contribution to science.

The correct answer is B, Fields Medal. Because Alfred Nobel's will created no prize for mathematics, the Fields Medal has come to be treated as the highest honour in the subject; it was first awarded in 1936, is named after the Canadian mathematician John Charles Fields, and is presented at the International Congress of Mathematicians once every four years to mathematicians under the age of forty. Option A is wrong because the Turing Award, given by the Association for Computing Machinery, is called the Nobel Prize of computing. Option C is wrong because the Copley Medal of the Royal Society, awarded since 1731, covers all the sciences and is the oldest scientific prize in the world. Option D is wrong because the Kavli Prize is awarded in astrophysics, nanoscience and neuroscience and not in mathematics.

The correct answer is B, Computer science. The Association for Computing Machinery has given the Turing Award every year since 1966 for lasting contributions of a technical nature to computing, and it is named after Alan Turing, the British mathematician who framed the idea of a universal computing machine and worked on breaking wartime codes. Option A is wrong because the highest honour in medicine is the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, decided at the Karolinska Institute. Option C is wrong because astronomy has no Nobel of its own; work in astrophysics is recognised through the Nobel Prize in Physics and through the Kavli Prize. Option D is wrong because the prize in economic sciences was instituted in memory of Alfred Nobel by the central bank of Sweden and has nothing to do with Turing.

The correct answer is B, the popularisation of science. The Kalinga Prize was created at UNESCO in 1951 from a gift made by Biju Patnaik of Odisha, later the Chief Minister of that state, and it was first awarded in 1952; it honours a writer, editor, broadcaster or film maker who has helped explain science to ordinary people, and the first recipient was the French physicist Louis de Broglie. Option A is wrong because research in nuclear physics would be recognised by the Nobel Prize in Physics, not by this award. Option C is wrong because environmental law is not the field of the Kalinga Prize. Option D is wrong because engineering design is covered by prizes such as the Bhatnagar Prize in engineering sciences in India and the Infosys Prize in engineering and computer science.

The correct answer is B, 1930. Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1930 for his work on the scattering of light and for the discovery of the effect named after him, and he was the first Asian to win a Nobel Prize in any of the sciences; he made the discovery on 28 February 1928, a date India keeps as National Science Day. Option A is wrong because 1913 is the year Rabindranath Tagore won the Nobel Prize in Literature, the first Nobel to come to India. Option C is wrong because 1954 is the year Raman was awarded the Bharat Ratna, in the first list of that honour, which is a separate fact. Option D is wrong because 1968 is the year Har Gobind Khorana shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for work on the genetic code.

The correct answer is B, the discovery of the Raman effect. C. V. Raman announced his discovery of the scattering effect now named after him on 28 February 1928, and since 1987 India has observed that date as National Science Day, with a theme, lectures and science fairs in schools and laboratories. Option A is wrong because the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research was founded in 1942 and its founding day is not this date. Option C is wrong because India's first satellite, Aryabhata, was launched in 1975 and the day is not marked as a national observance. Option D is wrong because the nuclear tests conducted at Pokhran in 1998 are marked on 11 May as National Technology Day, a date often exchanged with this one in examination papers.

The correct answer is B, 1901. Alfred Nobel signed his will in 1895 and died in 1896, and after his estate was settled the first prizes were given in 1901 in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and peace; they are presented every year on 10 December, the anniversary of his death. Option A is wrong because 1895 is the year of the will itself, not of the first award, and this is the commonest confusion in the question. Option C is wrong because 1913 is the year Rabindranath Tagore won the Prize in Literature. Option D is wrong because 1930 is the year of C. V. Raman's Prize in Physics. Note also that the prize in economic sciences was not part of Nobel's will and was added much later by the central bank of Sweden.

The correct answer is B, the Royal Society of London. The Royal Society has awarded the Copley Medal since 1731 for outstanding achievement in any branch of science, which makes it older than the Nobel Prizes by well over a century and a half; it is given every year and is open to researchers of any nationality, so it covers physics, chemistry, biology and mathematics alike. Option A is wrong because the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences decides the Nobel Prizes in physics and chemistry and the prize in economic sciences, and it awards no Copley Medal. Option C is wrong because UNESCO gives the Kalinga Prize, which is for the popularisation of science rather than for research. Option D is wrong because the National Academy of Sciences of the United States has medals of its own and elects foreign associates, but the Copley Medal has never been among its honours; the Royal Society also gives the Rumford and Davy Medals.

The correct answer is B, the structure of the ribosome. Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, born at Chidambaram in Tamil Nadu and later a citizen of the United States and the United Kingdom, shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2009 for showing how the ribosome, the machinery inside a cell that reads the genetic message and builds proteins, is put together. Option A is wrong because the structure of DNA was the work of Watson, Crick and Wilkins, honoured in 1962. Option C is wrong because the genetic code was the subject of the 1968 Prize in Physiology or Medicine shared by Har Gobind Khorana, who was also of Indian origin. Option D is wrong because stellar structure was the work for which Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar shared the Prize in Physics in 1983.

The correct answer is C, Mathematics. Instituted in 2005 by SASTRA University at Thanjavur in Tamil Nadu, the prize is given every year to a mathematician aged thirty-two or below for work in areas influenced by Srinivasa Ramanujan, and the age limit was set at thirty-two because that was the age at which Ramanujan died. Option A is wrong because physics has no Indian prize of this name; work in physics is recognised by the Bhatnagar Prize in physical sciences. Option B is wrong because chemistry too is covered by a separate branch of the Bhatnagar Prize. Option D is wrong because biotechnology has its own national awards from the Department of Biotechnology. Remember also that India observes National Mathematics Day on 22 December, Ramanujan's birthday.

The correct answer is A, Norway. The Abel Prize was created by the government of Norway and first awarded in 2003, and it is presented every year by the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters in memory of Niels Henrik Abel, the Norwegian mathematician who died young; unlike the Fields Medal it carries no age limit, which is why it is treated as the closest parallel to a Nobel Prize in mathematics. Option B is wrong because Sweden is the country of the Nobel Prizes, which include no award for mathematics. Option C is wrong because Denmark gives no prize of this name. Option D is wrong because Finland, though it hosted an International Congress of Mathematicians, does not award the Abel Prize; the Indian-origin mathematician S. R. Srinivasa Varadhan received it in 2007.

The correct answer is C, 45 years. The prize is meant to encourage scientists in the productive middle of their careers, so it is given for notable research carried out in India by a scientist who has not crossed forty-five years of age, and it covers seven disciplines from biological sciences to physical sciences. Option A is wrong because thirty-five is no limit under this prize; it resembles instead the age bar of certain young scientist fellowships. Option B is wrong because forty is the age limit of the Fields Medal in mathematics, and swapping the two is the usual trap here. Option D is wrong because fifty has never been the limit for this award. Note that the restructured national science awards announced in 2023 keep the Bhatnagar name for their young scientist category.