A Kansas University graduate was one of two scholars chosen as recipients of the 2002 Nobel Prize for economics, which was announced Wednesday.

Vernon L. Smith, who received his master’s degree in economics from KU in 1951, was one of two economists cited for contributions to the economic sciences. Smith is a professor of economics and law at George Mason University in Arlington, Va.

Smith arrived at KU in the fall of 1949. After earning his master’s degree, he continued to take classes at KU and was an instructor in KU’s economics department for a year. He received his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the California Institute of Technology and his doctorate in economics from Harvard University.

Smith has written or co-written 12 books and 250 articles on capital theory, finance, natural resource economics and experimental economics.

He shares the $1 million award with Daniel Kahneman, a professor at Princeton University. The two were recognized for their work on how psychology affects people’s buying decisions and for developing laboratory experiments in economics.

In 1995, former KU chemistry professor F. Sherwood Rowland received the Nobel Prize in chemistry. Rowland was an assistant professor of chemistry from 1956 to 1964.