● http://www.nobel.se

To find out more about this year's Nobel prize awards (see 'In the news' on page 786), take a look at the official web site of the Nobel Foundation — the Nobel e-Museum.

The site began in 1994 — the first year in which the Internet was used to announce the Nobel prize-winners — as the Nobel Web Site. It became the official web site of the Nobel Foundation in 1995 and was expanded in 2000 to form the Nobel e-Museum.

According to the site's curator, Nils Ringertz, the site aims “to inform about the achievements of the Nobel prize-winners, to promote the understanding of science, literature and peace work, and to stimulate the interest of students in the prize areas and the work of the prize winners”. To this end, it provides information about the Nobel prizes and all of the laureates in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and peace since these prizes were first awarded in 1901. It also lists laureates of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, which was initiated in 1969.

Other sections of the site describe the life and work of Alfred Nobel, the activities of the Nobel Foundation and the institutions responsible for awarding the prizes. There is also information about the Nobel Museum, which is celebrating 100 years of the Nobel prizes with a centennial exhibition. This will be based in Stockholm until 2004, with two touring exhibitions.

Curious visitors can repeat famous Nobel prize-winning experiments in a three-dimensional 'virtual biochemistry lab', with guidance from a virtual laboratory technician called Virtual Eve. And, should you wish, you can learn about Pavlov's work on conditioned reflexes by feeding sausages and bananas to — you guessed it — a virtual dog.