Ten Scientists and economists from the United States, Israel and Norway received their Nobel prizes on Friday at a ceremony in the capital of Sweden marked by the absence of literature laureate Elfriede Jelinek of Austria.

Kenyan environmental activist Wangari Maathai, the 2004 Nobel peace laureate, received her prize during a ceremony at Oslo's city hall in Norway, becoming the seventh African and the first African woman to win that award.

More than 1,300 guests, including Sweden's royal family, were invited to the awarding ceremony in Stockholm and a celebration dinner.

Likewise, the Norwegian royal family was among the hundreds of dignitaries attending the peace prize ceremony in Oslo.

This year's literature winner, the controversial Austrian feminist author and playwright Elfriede Jelinek, declined to receive her prize from Sweden's King Carl XVI Gustaf, citing her poor health and social phobia. She will receive the prize at the Swedish embassy instead.

This year's Nobel Prize announcements began on October 4, with the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine going to Americans Richard Axel and Linda B. Buck for their work on the sense of smell.

Americans David J. Gross, H. David Politzer and Frank Wilczek won the physics prize for their explanation of the force that binds particles inside the atomic nucleus.

The chemistry prize was awarded to Israelis Aaron Ciechanover and Avram Hershko and American Irwin Rose for their work in discovering a process that lets cells destroy unwanted proteins.

Norwegian Finn E. Kydland and American Edward C. Prescott received the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for shedding light on how government policies and actions affect economies worldwide.

The peace prize was given to Wangari Maathai, an environmental activist who is also Kenya's deputy environmental minister, for her work in sustaining and preserving the environment, along with improving human rights and democracy.

The Nobel Prizes are usually announced in October and are handed out every year on Dec. 10, the anniversary of the 1896 death of Alfred Nobel, a Swedish industrialist and the inventor of dynamite.

This year's prize carries a cash award of 10 million Swedish kronor (1.3 million US dollars), a gold medal and a diploma.

The Nobels, widely regarded as the world's most prestigious accolades in science and literature, have been awarded since 1901.

"Alfred Nobel realized the importance of science in the evolution of our world," Prof. Bengt Samuelsson, chairman of the Nobel Foundation, said in a speech at the awards ceremony.

"Modern society has become so dependent on science that its very foundation is based on scientific progress," he said.

Source: Xinhua