Physics Nobel won by laser wizardry – laureates include first woman in 55 years

I have no idea either, but it's probably worth pointing out that, for better or worse, promotion to full will entail a certain degree of bean counting. Thus, there are a number of perfectly respectable ways to not meet those metrics. For example, someone who decides to tackle a very hard problem with very high risk of failure is likely to look less productive on paper.

In many top universities in Canada, promotion to Full Professor doesn't confer any particular benefits. No salary raises (unless your Faculty are unionized, and you are below the mandated "floor" salary for Full Professor ... which is very unlikely, because it's so low, by design). Same workload. If anything it's worse because you might be asked to serve on more departmental and faculty committees.

He supervisor said something that sticks with me: “The person in the crows nest shouting “land ho!” Doesn’t get the credit, it’s the captain of the ship”.

While there’s some truth to that, it’s certainly the case that many people who work hard do not get their deserved recognition.

The Mössbauer Effect is named for the graduate student who discovered it. He, and not his advisor, won the associated Nobel Prize.

I think what they're saying is that current scientific achievements are usually the result of huge swaths of scientists from all manner of disciplines working together, and giving an award to a single researcher is usually just a popularity contest or publicity stunt that ignores the work of everyone else.

> It has now been a while, that achievements are rarely done in trios, duos or in solitude. It is a farce to all other hard working scientists.

Achievements in modern science are usually seen as incremental, done as part of a larger team and based on a substantial body of prior work. I think the author is trying to say that behind these successes, there are people who may have committed as much to the field but achieved no recognition. In my experience the larger teams / collaborations thing seems to be more of a Particle Physics thing.

> This recognition is for those, who successfully appropriate the spirit of a given time. Aside from the propaganda/marketing stunt.

The author, I believe, is saying that success is more to do with luck. I'm not sure I agree -- there tends to be a network effect with science that people who have proven themselves get offered better opportunities and so can in some cases have a cluster of successes, but I have heard similar sentiments and they're not so easily dismissed.

From how I read it, it's her reaction when being told there have only been a few other women receiving the Physics Nobel.