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by admissionsguy 1049 days ago
> I don't know what Kwon actually wants out of all of this stunt

He may be just a grifter. Or he may have played a key role in the discovery but was going to be put as the 6th author (at best) in the joint paper. If so, he has already gained much more recognition than he would have otherwise.
1 comments
dorchadas 1049 days ago
I feel it's pretty clear he's aiming for the Nobel if it's true. It can only be split three ways, after all.
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_0ffh 1049 days ago
Yeah, but that is quite amateurish. Just having the paper out first does not establish priority for the Nobel. What you need is the first paper with solid proof. It has happened more than once before that the guys with the second or third paper won the Nobel because the earlier paper was too weak.
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_0ffh 1049 days ago
To add a concrete example: Randy Hulet at Rice claimed BEC first, then Wieman and Cornell at Colorado, then Ketterle at MIT. Wieman, Cornell and Ketterle shared the Nobel. Hulet was passed over, because his data was judged insufficient to establish his claim.
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