The United States leads the world in Nobel Prize winners: 35% of the award winners were immigrants
Immigrants represent a 1/3 of US Nobel Prizes. Undermining university independence risks stalling innovation in vital research fields
George Mason University’s College of Humanities and Social Sciences released a report examining Nobel Prize winners in late 2024, and one of the findings has garnered interest, in light of the current anti-immigration agenda being pushed by the Trump administration.
Researchers found that of the 749 Nobel Prize academic winners, meaning they obtained the award in chemistry, economics, medicine, and physics, from the United States, 35 percent were immigrants. "Nearly half (44%) of these 142 immigrant Nobel Laureates obtained their highest educational degree in the United States," report the authors.
The push to weaken the independence of US universities
The figures highlight the important role US institutions of higher learning have played in attracting thinkers from all over the world. The Trump administration is looking to control the admissions process for international students at major universities, which threatens the independence of the institutions. The lack of independence may lead top candidates to study in other countries, if the reputation of the institution is hurt by the actions taken by the federal government.
"I found my tribe. The tribe of science."
— The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) March 13, 2025
Ardem Patapoutian was born in Beirut, Lebanon, and relocated to Los Angeles, USA, at the age of 18. He shares the immigrant experience with numerous Nobel Prize laureates and acknowledges that bringing together people from different… pic.twitter.com/NKrwHm4o6P
Dramatically limiting educational visas to the United States to prospective students whose politics align with the GOP’s perceived interests of the country ignores the dissenting role international students and scholars have played in the country’s political history. In fields like Chemistry, where 55 percent of winners attended a US university, whereas in Economics the figure is 68 percent, when looking at the total number of prizes.
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