Gender divide persists in Nobel history as women make up 6.6% of laureates since 1901

By: Team India Tracker

Women remain vastly underrepresented in science and technology Nobels, highlighting persistent global gender gaps despite growing participation in research

Since the first Nobel prizes were awarded in 1901, women remain a small minority among the world’s most celebrated achievers. Out of 1,026 laureates recognised across six disciplines, only 68 have been women—a share of just 6.6 per cent, according to Nobel Foundation data. Despite periodic milestones, the gender gap remains entrenched, particularly in the sciences.

The disparity reflects both historical exclusion and systemic inequities in access to education, funding, and recognition. While women have made significant breakthroughs in fields ranging from medicine to peacebuilding, their representation continues to be clustered in certain categories, notably Literature and Peace.

Uneven representation

The Peace Prize and Literature Prize stand out as the most gender-inclusive categories. The Nobel Peace Prize has honoured 19 women so far — about 15 per cent of its total recipients. Among them are global icons such as Mother Teresa, Malala Yousafzai, and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, whose advocacy reshaped humanitarian and political discourse. Similarly, 17 women have received the Nobel Prize in Literature, accounting for around 14 per cent of winners. Figures like Toni Morrison, Gabriela Mistral, and Olga Tokarczuk not only broke literary ground but also expanded the cultural imagination of what women could represent in the arts.

By contrast, the representation of women in the sciences remains strikingly low. Only four women—Marie Curie, Maria Goeppert Mayer, Donna Strickland, and Andrea Ghez—have received the Nobel Prize in Physics. Curie remains the only person ever to win Nobel Prizes in two different sciences (Physics in 1903 and Chemistry in 1911), a feat unmatched even after more than a century.

In Chemistry, 13 women have been honoured, a number that has grown slightly in recent years with recognitions such as Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna in 2020 for developing the CRISPR gene-editing technique. In Physiology or Medicine, 13 women have received the prize since its inception, including pioneers like Barbara McClintock and Tu Youyou, whose discovery of artemisinin revolutionised malaria treatment.

This year’s additions

In 2025, two women joined the Nobel roster: María Corina Machado, the Venezuelan opposition leader, received the Peace Prize for her struggle for democracy and human rights, while Mary E Brunkow, an American neuroscientist, shared the Medicine Prize for her work on neurodegenerative diseases. Their recognition slightly improves women’s share among laureates, but it also highlights how incremental the progress has been.

Women remain dramatically underrepresented in STEM-related Nobels, reflecting the broader global imbalance in scientific leadership. Even as more women enter research, the path to top-tier recognition remains narrow. Analysts point out that bias in nomination patterns—typically driven by elite institutions and senior male scientists—plays a major role in perpetuating the imbalance.

Persistent barriers

The Nobel Committee has faced growing scrutiny for its slow pace of diversification. Although the foundation has pledged to make the nomination process more inclusive, the challenge runs deeper: only those nominated by a select network of academics and previous laureates are considered, and this network historically excludes women and researchers from developing nations.

The gender gap also mirrors structural inequities in academic publishing, funding access, and leadership roles. A UNESCO report in 2023 found that women make up 33 per cent of the world’s researchers but hold less than 12 per cent of senior scientific positions. Without addressing these upstream barriers, Nobel recognition is likely to remain skewed.

Slow march toward parity

While symbolic milestones—such as Charpentier and Doudna’s win or Malala’s Peace Prize—have inspired new generations, true parity remains distant. The Nobel Prize, still considered the pinnacle of human achievement, continues to reflect a world where women’s contributions are often under-acknowledged or overlooked.

For now, the addition of Machado and Brunkow adds two more names to a list still far too short—a reminder that even as women reshape science, politics, and literature, recognition remains a race they are still catching up to win.