The Shaw Prize 2025 announced

Four scientists from the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan and Canada were awarded this year’s Shaw Prize for their contributions in the fields of astronomy, life science and medicine as well as mathematical science.

Wolfgang Baumeister, Director Emeritus and Scientific Member of the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry in Germany, received the Prize in Life Science and Medicine.

He was honored for his breakthrough in cryogenic-electron tomography, a technique that shows 3D images of the inner workings of cells at a near-atomic level, by freezing the sample rapidly at an extremely low temperature.

The Prize in Astronomy went to John Richard Bond, Professor of the Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics and University Professor at the University of Toronto, and George Efstathiou, Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge in the UK.

The pair was awarded for their pioneering research in cosmology, particularly studies of fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background. Their predictions have led to precise determinations of the age, geometry, and mass-energy content of the universe.

Japanese scientist Kenji Fukaya, professor at the Beijing Institute of Mathematical Sciences and Applications and the Yau Mathematical Sciences Center of China’s Tsinghua University, won the Prize in Mathematical Sciences.

He was recognized for his work on symplectic geometry, especially for envisioning the existence of a category, now called the Fukaya category.

Each Shaw Prize laureates will receive US$1.2 million in prize money. An award presentation ceremony will be held on October 21st.

(Jamie Liu)