Past Years

Listed below are the topics of and participants in the Nobel conferences at Gustavus Adolphus College since the inception of the conference series in 1965. An asterisk (*) denotes participants who are Nobel laureates. The College has developed a tradition of honoring laureates visiting the campus with honorary degrees: Since 1950, 88 laureates have been so honored, and of the 63 laureates who have appeared at one or more conferences since 1965, 57 have accepted honorary degrees (Tjalling Koopmans declined the honor in 1978; Stanley Prusiner was not present on campus to received the honor in 2001; and Steven Weinberg, James Buchanan, Elizabeth Blackburn, and Joseph Stiglitz had not yet won Nobel Prizes when they appeared at their respective conferences in 1976, 1986, 1999, and 2000).

2013 (XLIX) - The Universe at Its Limits

• George Coyne
• Alexei Filippenko
• S. James Gates Jr.
• Lawrence Krauss
• Tara Shears
• *George Smoot
• *Samuel Ting
• *Frank Wilczek

2012 (XLVIII) - Our Global Ocean

• Barbara Block
• David Gallo
• Kathleen Dean Moore
• Carl Safina
• William Fitzgerald
• Ove Hoegh-Guldberg
• Christopher Sabine
• Maya Tolstoy

2011 (XLVII) - The Brain and Being Human

• John Donoghue
• Martha Farah
• Paul Glimcher
• Helen Mayberg
• Nancey Murphy
• Aniruddh Patel
• Vilayanur Ramachandran
• Larry Young

2010 (XLVI) - Making Food Good

• Bina Agarwal
• Linda Bartoshuk
• Cary Fowler
• Jeffrey Friedman
• Frances Moore Lappé
• Marion Nestle
• Paul Thompson

2009 (XLV) - H₂O Uncertain Resource

• Asit K. Biswas
• Peter H. Gleick
• William L. Graf
• *Rajendra K. Pachauri
• Nancy N. Rabalais
• Larry L. Rasmussen
• David L. Sedlak

2008 (XLIV) - Who Were the First Humans?

• Robin I. M. Dunbar
• Marcus W. Feldman
• J. Wentzel van Huyssteen
• Curtis Marean
• Svante Pääbo
• Dennis J. Stanford

2007 (XLIII) - Heating Up: The Energy Debate

• *Steven Chu
• Kenneth S. Deffeyes
• Lee Rybeck Lynd
• James E. Hansen
• Paul L. Joskow
• Joan M. Ogden
• Will Steger

2006 (XLII) - Medicine: Prescription for Tomorrow

• Henry J. Aaron
• *J. Michael Bishop
• Daniel Callahan
• Steven Miles
• Michael Osterholm
• Dame Julia Polak
• Jennifer West

2005 (XLI) - The Legacy of Einstein

• *Wolfgang Ketterle
• George F. R. Ellis
• Ira Flatow
• Wendy Freedman
• Sylvester James Gates Jr.
• Thomas Levenson
• Kip S. Thorne

2004 (XL) - The Science of Aging

• Laura L. Carstensen
• Leonard Hayflick
• Cynthia J. Kenyon
• S. Jay Olshansky
• Dennis J. Selkoe
• Peter J. Whitehouse

2003 (XXXIX) - The Story of Life

• *Christian R. de Duve
• Sean B. Carroll
• Philip J. Currie
• Niles Eldredge
• B. Rosemary Grant
• Peter R. Grant
• John F. Haught
• Tim D. White

2002 (XXXVIII) - The Nature of Nurture

• Avshalom Caspi
• Jerome Kagan
• *Eric R. Kandel
• Eleanor E. Maccoby
• Thomas H. Murray
• Robert Plomin
• Judith L. Rapoport

2001 (XXXVII) - What is still to be discovered?

• *Günter Blobel
• *Edmond H. Fischer
• *Roald Hoffmann
• *Sir Harold W. Kroto
• *Stanley B. Prusiner
• Erling Norrby
• Sir John Maddox
• Cornelia Dean

2000 (XXXVI) - Globalization 2000: Economic Prospects and Challenges

• Jagdish Bhagwati
• John B. Cobb Jr.
• Amitai Etzioni
• *Robert Mundell
• Jeffrey D. Sachs
• Michael Sohlman
• *Joseph E. Stiglitz

1999 (XXXV) - Genetics in the New Millennium

• Bruce Baker
• *Elizabeth Blackburn
• Lindon Eaves
• Dean Hamer
• Leroy Hood
• Evelyn Fox Keller
• J. Craig Venter

1998 (XXXIV) - Virus: The Human Connection

• Alfred Worchester Crosby
• Robert C. Gallo
• John J. Holland
• W.K. Joklik
• Elizabeth G. Nabel
• Gary J. Nabel
• C.J. Peters
• Ted Peters

1997 (XXXIII) - Unveiling the Solar System: 30 Years of Exploration

• Alan P. Boss
• Story Musgrave
• *F. Sherwood Rowland
• Robert John Russell
• Carl Sagan
• Roald Sagdeev
• Eugene Shoemaker
• David J. Stevenson
• Edward C. Stone

1996 (XXXII) - Apes at the End of an Age: Primate Language and Behavior in the '90s

• Frans B.M. de Waal
• Biruté M.F. Galdikas
• Gordon Kaufman
• Tetsuro Matsuzawa
• Duane M. Rumbaugh
• Sue Savage-Rumbaugh
• Richard W. Wrangham

1995 (XXXI) - The New Shape of Matter: Materials Challenge Science

• *Philip W. Anderson
• Susan N. Coppersmith
• *Pierre-Gilles de Gennes
• Frederick Ferré
• Harry B. Gray
• *Harold W. Kroto
• Silvan S. Schweber

1994 (XXX) - Unlocking the Brain: Progress in Neuroscience

• Anders Björklund
• Patricia Smith Churchland
• Antonio Damasio
• Apostolos Georgopoulos
• *David Hubel
• *Eric R. Kandel
• Oliver Sacks

1993 (XXIX) - Nature Out of Balance: The New Ecology

• Daniel B. Botkin
• Jared M. Diamond
• Thomas E. Lovejoy
• Robert McCredie May
• Donella H. Meadows
• Bryan G. Norton
• George Masters Woodwell

1992 (XXVIII) - Immunity: The Battle Within

• *Baruj Benacerraf
• R. Michael Blaese
• Robert C. Gallo
• Philippa Marrack
• Candace Pert
• Holmes Rolston III
• Jonas Salk

1991 (XXVII) - The Evolving Cosmos

• Timoth Ferris
• *William A. Fowler
• Margaret Geller
• Edward Harrison
• Ernan McMullin
• Phillip Morrison

1990 (XXVI) - Chaos: The New Science

• Mitchell Feigenbaum
• James Gleick
• Benoit Mandelbrot
• Heinz-Otto Peitgen
• John Polkinghorne
• *Ilya Prigogine
• Stephen Smale

1989 (XXV) - The End of Science?

• *Sheldon Lee Glashow
• Ian Hacking
• Sandra Harding
• Mary Hesse
• Gerald Holton
• Gunther S. Stent

1988 (XXIV) - The Restless Earth

• Don L. Anderson
• W.G. Ernst
• David Ray Griffin
• Jack Oliver
• David M. Raup
• J. Tuzo Wilson

1987 (XXIII) - Evolution of Sex

• William Donald Hamilton
• Philip Hefner
• Sarah Blaffer Hrdy
• Lynn Margulis
• Peter Raven
• John Maynard Smith

1986 (XXII) - The Legacy of Keynes

• Karl Brunner
• *James Buchanan
• Geoffrey C. Harcourt
• Axel Leijonhufvud
• Ronald Haydn Preston
• Baron Stig Ramel
• Lester Thurow
• *James Tobin

1985 (XXI) - The Impact of Science on Society

• Winston J. Brill
• Daniel Kevles
• *Salvador Luria
• J. Robert Nelson
• Merritt Roe Smith

1984 (XX) - How We Know: The Inner Frontiers of Cognitive Science

• Daniel Dennett
• *Gerald Edelman
• Brenda Milner
• Arthur Peacocke
• Roger Schank
• *Herbert Simon

1983 (XIX) - Manipulating Life

• *Christian Anfinsen
• Willard Gaylin
• June Goodfield
• Clifford Grobstein
• Karen Lebacqz
• Lewis Thomas

1982 (XVIII) - Darwin's Legacy

• Stephen Jay Gould
• Richard E. Leakey
• *Sir Peter Medawar
• Jaroslav Pelikan
• Irving Stone
• Edward O. Wilson

1981 (XVII) - The Place of Mind in Nature

• *Ragnar Granit
• Wolfhart Pannenberg
• Richard Rorty
• John Archibald Wheeler
• *Eugene Wigner

1980 (XVI) - The Aesthetic Dimension of Science

• Freeman J. Dyson
• Charles Hartshorne
• *William N. Lipscomb Jr.
• Gunther Schuller
• *C.N. Yang

1979 (XV) - The Future of the Market Economy

• Robert Benne
• Richard Lipsey
• Kenneth McLennan
• Baron Stig Ramel
• Mark Willes

1978 (XIV) - Global Resources: Perspectives and alternatives

• Ian Barbour
• Barry Commoner
• Garrett Hardin
• *Tjalling C. Koopmans
• Letitia Obeng

1977 (XIII) - The Nature of Life

• *Max Delbrück
• René Dubos
• Sidney Fox
• Bernard M. Loomer
• Peter Marler
• Elizabeth Shull Russell

1976 (XII) - The Nature of the Physical Universe

• *Murray Gell-Mann
• Sir Fred Hoyle
• Stanley L. Jaki
• Hiliary W. Putnam
• *Steven Weinberg
• Victor F. Weisskopf

1975 (XI) - The Future of Science

• *Sir John Eccles
• Langdon Gilkey
• *Polykarp Kusch
• *Glenn Seaborg

—Plus 24 Nobel laureates and five theologians who served as panelists

1974 (X) - The Quest for Peace

• Rubem Alves
• Elisabeth Mann Borgese
• *Polykarp Kusch
• Robert Jay Lifton
• Baron Stig Ramel
• *Paul A. Samuelson

1973 (IX) - The Destiny of Women

• Mary Daly
• Martha Griffiths
• Beatrix Hamburg
• Eleanore Maccoby
• Johnnie Tillmon

1972 (VIII) - The End of Life

• Edgar M. Carlson
• Alexander Comfort
• Nathan Scott Jr.
• Krister Stendahl
• *Ulf von Euler
• *George Wald

1971 (VII) - Shaping the Future

• *Norman Borlaug
• John McHale
• *Glenn Seaborg
• Joseph Sittler
• Anthony Wiener

1970 (VI) - Creativity

• William Arrowsmith
• Jacob Bronowski
• *Willard Libby
• Donald MacKinnon
• Gordon Parks

1969 (V) - Communication

• Leroy Augenstein
• Edgar M. Carlson
• Noam Chomsky
• Abraham Kaplan
• Eric Lenneberg
• Peter Marler

1968 (IV) - The Uniqueness of Man

• Theodosius Dobzhansky
• *Sir John Eccles
• Ernan McMullin
• W.H. Thorpe
• S.L. Washburn
• Daniel Williams

1967 (III) - The Human Mind

• *Sir John Eccles
• James Gustafson
• Holger Hyden
• Seymour Kety
• Francis Schmitt
• Huston Smith
• Nils Stahle

1966 (II) - The Control of the Environment

• Kenneth Boulding
• René Dubos
• Orville Freeman
• Roger Revelle
• Carl Rowan

1965 (I) - Genetics and the Future of Man

• Kingsley Davis
• H. Bentley Glass
• *Polykarp Kusch
• R. Paul Ramsey
• Sheldon Reed
• *William Shockley
• *Edward Tatum