NOBEL FOUNDATION

private institution founded in 1900 to coordinate the various provisions of the will of Alfred Nobel, in which he set aside funds to establish the Nobel Prizes. The foundation administers these funds. The foundation's representative body, the Board, is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden, and consists of seven members and two deputies who are either Swedish or Norwegian. The members are elected by the trustees of the four Nobel Prize-awarding institutions: the Karolinska Institute, the Norwegian Nobel Committee, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and the Swedish Academy. The duties of the foundation are to represent the prize-awarding organizations and to assist them in all activities associated with the announcement of the winners. The most important task of the Nobel Foundation is that of managing the large fortune from which the Nobel Prizes are awarded.