2 Nobel Prize Winners from Japan to Attend Award Ceremony in Stockholm

By Naomi Nagao / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writer

15:32 JST, December 10, 2025

STOCKHOLM — This year’s Nobel Prize winners from Japan, Shimon Sakaguchi and Susumu Kitagawa, both aged 74, will attend the award ceremony at a concert hall in Stockholm on Wednesday evening.

Sakaguchi, a distinguished honorary professor at the University of Osaka, won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, and Kitagawa, a distinguished professor at Kyoto University, won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

The concert hall is the venue for the award ceremony for winners in all disciplines — physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and economics — except for the Nobel Peace Prize, the award ceremony of which takes place in Oslo.

Sakaguchi and Kitagawa are expected to receive their medals at about 4:30 p.m. on Wednesday.

On Tuesday, the two Japanese scientists attended a celebration organized by the Japanese Embassy in Stockholm in their honor. For the first time, the embassy asked them to sign autographs on chairs, following a Nobel Prize Museum tradition.

“I’d like to continue working hard so that I can serve as a bridge connecting science and society,” Sakaguchi said.

“In the Kansai region, we have a culture in which we can freely discuss and conduct research,” Kitagawa said. “Receiving this prize is due in large part to the efforts made by our forerunners.”