The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1943 was awarded to George de Hevesy "for his work on the use of isotopes as tracers in the study of chemical processes".
 

George de Hevesy received his Nobel Prize one year later, in 1944. During the selection process in 1943, the Nobel Committee for Chemistry decided that none of the year's nominations met the criteria as outlined in the will of Alfred Nobel. According to the Nobel Foundation's statutes, the Nobel Prize can in such a case be reserved until the following year, and this statute was then applied. George de Hevesy therefore received his Nobel Prize for 1943 one year later, in 1944.
 

When, in 1913, de Hevesy was working with Rutherford in Manchester, this young scientist had been commissioned to isolate radium D from radioactive lead. Although unsuccessful, de Hevesy's efforts were not wasted. They gave him the idea for a new method of chemical research. By using radium D as a marker, de Hevesy determined the solubility of highly insoluble lead compounds. De Hevesy also carried out several investigations with radioactive sodium and potassium. De Hevesy used deuterium as marker in many tests. He then noticed that a person who has drunk water containing heavy hydrogen excretes deuterium in the urine after only 26 minutes.