A bright light in the dark

"The week leading up to the awards is stacked with lectures, concerts, exhibitions and discussions, and Stockholm is decorated with light displays and video shows. The whole thing feels like the Oscars. People line up on the street to catch a glimpse of celebrities as they leave the Stockholm Concert Hall. National public television dedicates more than five hours to a live broadcast of the ceremony and subsequent banquet."

"Huge numbers of Swedes tune in not just for the glamour but to hear interviews with researchers, learn about medical breakthroughs, and explore advances in fields such as materials science and quantum physics. It's inspiring. It gives me hope that a general populace can still get excited about science and support it. That's a stark contrast to what we've seen in the U.S., where science has endured an annus horribilis: research funding slashed, government support dwindling, and growing segments of the population embracing misinformation."

"At the banquet, one of my tablematesa vice chancellor from a major Swedish universityexpressed concern about these trends. She told me she had a meeting planned with other European university leaders in the new year, where they would discuss how to respond to future attacks on science, using the U.S. and Hungary as their cautionary examples. Yet the work honored in 2025 offers a profound counternarrative to that despair."

Stockholm's Nobel Week functions as a national celebration featuring lectures, concerts, exhibitions, light displays and video shows that draw widespread public attention. Large crowds line up to see attendees and national public television airs extensive live coverage of the ceremony and banquet. Audiences tune in to hear researchers, learn about medical breakthroughs, and explore advances in materials science and quantum physics. Swedish public enthusiasm contrasts with declining U.S. research funding, reduced government support and growing misinformation. European university leaders plan to coordinate responses to attacks on science, and 2025 prize-winning research in macroscopic quantum tunneling offers new tools and cautious optimism.

Read at www.scientificamerican.com