First Kavli Prize Winners announced
In a simulcast linking New York with Oslo, the winners of the inaugural Kavli Prizes have been announced at the World Science Summit. The three $1,000,000 Kavli Prizes, a partnership between the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters, The Kavli Foundation, and the Norwegian Ministry of Education and Research, recognize exceptional achievements in the fields of astrophysics, nanoscience, and neuroscience.
The winners of the astrophysics prize are Maarten Schmidt (Caltech) and Donald Lynden-Bell (Cambridge University) for their pioneering work on exceptionally active and luminous nuclei of galaxies, known as quasars.
The nanoscience prize goes to Louis E. Brus (Columbia University) and Sumio Iijima (Meijo University, Japan) for their respective discoveries of two kinds of objects that play a central role for current research on nanometer scales: semi-conductor nanocrystals known as quantum dots, and nanotubes.
The neuroscience prize is shared between Pasko Rakic (Yale University School of Medicine) for his work on embryonic brain development, Thomas Jessell (Columbia University) for his exploration of chemical signals that play a role when nerve cells assemble to form neuronal circuits, and Sten Grillner (Karolinska Institute, Stockholm) for showing how neuronal circuits in the spine help control rhythmic movements such as those involved in locomotion.
After the announcement, the World Science Summit continued with a conversation between Fred Kavli and Alan Alda in which Kavli retraced the origin of the Kavli prizes, rejoicing at what he felt was a “great day for science.”
Images: Left: Quasar 3C279, Image courtesy of NRAO/AUI; center: depiction of carbon nanotube by User Arneo, Wikimedia Commons; right: brain image posted by User Methoxyroxy to Wikimedia Commons.
This post was written by Markus
Tags: Alan Alda, Donald Lynden-Bell, Fred Kavli, Kavli Prize, Louis E. Brus, Maarten Schmidt, Pasko Rakic, Sten Grillner, Sumio Iijima, Thomas Jessell, World Science Summit