The latest honours and prizes

Adriano Rutz, a Postdoc at ETH Zurich, wins the first National Prize for Open Research Data (ORD) for “The LOTUS Initiative” project. LOTUS explores new ways of promoting the re-use of data in the fields of biology and chemistry and thus of sharing knowledge in natural products research.

The Pfizer Research Prize, one of the most prestigious in the field of medical research in Switzerland, has been awarded annually since 1992 in five different categories to young scientists conducting research at Swiss research institutes or hospitals. The award is aimed at outstanding contributions in basic or clinical research.

The International Birnstiel Award was launched in 2019. One of the six awardees in 2021 is Dr. Gregor Weiss of the Pilhofer lab who developed high-end imaging workflows using cryo-electron tomography together with complementing techniques to study bacterial cell-cell interactions.

EMBO today announced that 64 life scientists have been elected to its membership. The new EMBO Members and Associate Members join the community of more than 1,800 leading life scientists.

The American National Academy of Sciences has awarded membership to the three ETH Zurich professors.

Daniela Latorre, SNSF PRIMA group leader at the Institute of Microbiology of the Department of Biology, was awarded the Pfizer Prize for Research 2020 as one of 19 young researchers.

In its press release of 11 June, the European Molecular Biology Organisation announces who has been appointed EMBO member in 2019. One of the 56 newly elected members is Julia Vorholt, group leader at the Institute of Microbiology of the Department of Biology.

The jury of the Friedrich Miescher Prize announced the two awardees for 2018: Paola Picotti (professor at the Institute of Molecular Systems Biology, ETH Zurich) shares the award with Marek Basler (Biozentrum Basel). The prize honours young biochemists.

The Sanofi Pasteur Award recognizes researchers for past or ongoing work that demonstrates significant scientific progress in the life sciences. Antonio Lanzavecchia receives the prize for his research on the role of human monoclonal antibodies in the fight against malaria.

The Postdoctoral Award for Microbiology goes to Médéric Diard in recognition of his work on the pathogenesis and ecology of enterobacteria.

The Robert Koch Foundation is jointly awarding the 2017 Robert Koch Award to Professors Antonio Lanzavecchia and Rafi Ahmed. The award recognizes the two immunologists’ pioneering research on regulation of immune system and their ground-breaking contributions on the development of new vaccines and immunotherapies.

Markus Aebi, professor at the Institute of Microbiology (D-BIOL), has won the Lelio Orci Award 2016. He has been honoured for his achievements in the field of glycobiology. Aebi is the second recipient of the award.

Ruedi Aebersold, professor at the Institute of Molecular Systems Biology (D-BIOL), has been honoured by Lund University in Sweden: the Faculty of Medicine has awarded him an honorary doctorate.