Facebook-Gründer Mark Zuckerberg hat zusammen mit Google-Mitbegründer Sergej Brin und dem russischen Investor Yuri Milner den Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences (BPLS) ausgeschrieben. Vergeben wird der Preis von einer eigens dafür ins Leben gerufenen Stiftung, deren Vorsitz Apple-Vorstand Art Levinson, unter anderem früherer CEO des Biotech-Unternehmens Gentech, einnimmt.
Durch den Preis werden herausragende Leistungen von Forschern in den Lebenswissenschaften gewürdigt. Ziel sei es, mehr öffentliche Aufmerksamkeit auf Wissenschaft und Forschung zu lenken, so Levinson. Die Auszeichnung soll pro Jahr an mindestens 5 Wissenschaftler vergeben werden und ist mit jeweils 3 Mio. USD dot
iert – deutlich höher als der Nobelpreis (ca. 1,1 Mio USD). Ähnlich wie beim Nobelpreis werden die Vorjahressieger ihre Nachfolger auswählen.
In diesem Jahr gab es gleich 11 Preisträger. Bis auf Shinya Yamanaka von der Kyoto-Universität in Japan, stammen alle ausgezeichneten Forscher aus den USA. Zu den Siegern gehören:
- Cornelia I. Bargmann
Torsten N. Wiesel Professor and Head of the Lulu and Anthony Wang Laboratory of Neural Circuits and Behavior at the Rockefeller University. Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator.
For the genetics of neural circuits and behavior, and synaptic guidepost molecules.
- David Botstein
Director of the Lewis-Sigler Institute for Integrative Genomics and the Anthony B. Evnin Professor of Genomics at Princeton University.
For linkage mapping of Mendelian disease in humans using DNA polymorphisms.
- Lewis C. Cantley
Margaret and Herman Sokol Professor and Director of the Cancer Center at Weill Cornell Medical College and NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital.
For the discovery of PI 3-Kinase and its role in cancer metabolism.
- Hans Clevers
Professor of Molecular Genetics at Hubrecht Institute. President of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.
For describing the role of Wnt signaling in tissue stem cells and cancer.
- Napoleone Ferrara
Distinguished Professor of Pathology and Senior Deputy Director for Basic Sciences at Moores Cancer Center at the University of California, San Diego.
For discoveries in the mechanisms of angiogenesis that led to therapies for cancer and eye diseases.
- Titia de Lange
Leon Hess Professor, Head of the Laboratory of Cell Biology and Genetics, and Director of the Anderson Center for Cancer Research at the Rockefeller University.
For research on telomeres, illuminating how they protect chromosome ends and their role in genome instability in cancer.
- Eric S. Lander
President and Founding Director of the Eli and Edythe L. Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. Professor of Biology at MIT. Professor of Systems Biology at Harvard Medical School.
For the discovery of general principles for identifying human disease genes, and enabling their application to medicine through the creation and analysis of genetic, physical and sequence maps of the human genome.
- Charles L. Sawyers
Chair, Human Oncology and Pathogenesis Program at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator.
For cancer genes and targeted therapy.
- Bert Vogelstein
Director of the Ludwig Center and Clayton Professor of Oncology and Pathology at the Johns Hopkins Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center. Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator.
For cancer genomics and tumor suppressor genes.
- Robert A. Weinberg
Daniel K. Ludwig Professor for Cancer Research at MIT and Director of the MIT/Ludwig Center for Molecular Oncology. Member, Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research.
For characterization of human cancer genes.
- Shinya Yamanaka
Director of Center for iPS Cell Research and Application, Kyoto University. Senior Investigator, Gladstone Institutes, San Francisco.
For induced pluripotent stem cells.