Home security camera catches moment Nobel Prize winner finds out he won

STANFORD, California – When you think of the Nobel Prize, you probably think of brainiacs, Albert Einstein and an award show in suits. But Paul Milgrom, a professor of Economics at Stanford University, found out he won the prestigious award while he was half asleep.

This Nest home camera caught the whole moment as Milgrom was woken up by his neighbor Robert Wilson, his colleague and fellow winner, in the middle of the night.

According to a post by the university, the award committee could not reach Milgrom to share the news so Wilson, his fellow winner and neighbor, knocked on his door in the middle of the night.

In a black and white camera video, Wilson can be seen peeking through windows and knocking on the front door of Milgrom’s home in a desperate attempt to alert his colleague.

“Paul? Paul? Paul? It’s Bob Wilson, you’ve won the Nobel Prize," Wilson says in the video. “They’re trying to reach you, but they don’t seem to have a number.”

According to a post by the university on Twitter, Wilson rang Milgrom’s doorbell at 2:15 a.m. and Milgrom’s wife, who’s in Sweden, received a security-camera notification on her phone. She got to watch live as Wilson told Milgrom he’d won the award.

Milgrom won the Sveriges Riksbank Prize prize in Economic Sciences for “for improvements to auction theory and inventions of new auction formats,” according to the committee.

Learn more about Milgrom’s award by clicking here.

Related: 2 Stanford economists win Nobel prize for improving auctions