Breakthrough Prize and ALLEA announce partnership

The Breakthrough Prize and ALLEA, the European Federation of Academies of Sciences and Humanities, today announced a partnership to further the shared goal of promoting a culture where science and scholarship can thrive.

ALLEA brings together 59 academies in more than 40 countries, with members leading scholarly enquiry across all fields of the natural sciences, social sciences and humanities.

For the sixth year, the Breakthrough Prize, recognized as the world’s largest science prize, will honor top scientists, handing out up to five prizes in Life Sciences, one in Fundamental Physics and one in Mathematics. Each prize comes with a $3 million award.

As an international award, the Breakthrough Prize welcomes nominations on behalf of outstanding researchers throughout the world. Starting this year, ALLEA’s website and communication channels are raising awareness of the opportunity to nominate great scientists and mathematicians, and directing nominators to the Breakthrough Prize nomination form. All researchers in Europe are encouraged to visit the site and make a nomination on behalf of outstanding scientists and colleagues.

For the sixth year, the Breakthrough Prize, recognized as the world’s largest science prize, will honor top scientists, handing out up to five prizes in Life Sciences, one in Fundamental Physics and one in Mathematics. Each prize comes with a $3 million award.

The Breakthrough Prize was founded by Sergey Brin and Anne Wojcicki, Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan, and Yuri and Julia Milner to celebrate achievements in Fundamental Physics, Life Sciences and Mathematics. The awards are presented at an annual globally televised ceremony, followed by a day of lectures and discussions co-sponsored by Stanford University, University of California, Berkeley and University of California, San Francisco. In addition to the Breakthrough Prize, awards for junior researchers in mathematics and physics are also handed out yearly.

To learn more visit, https://allea.org/breakthrough-prize

Download Press Release

Contact

For Breakthrough Prize

Kristen Bothwell
KBothwell@Rubenstein.com / 212-843-9227

For ALLEA

Susana Irles
Irles@allea.org /+49 (0)30-3259873-72

ALLEA stands with the Central European University

 

ALLEA sends letter of support for Central European University in light of proposed legislative changes in Hungary.

“We consider the proposed legislation a fundamental threat to basic and internationally valid principles for conducting science and research”, states ALLEA President Professor Günter Stock in a letter addressed to the Hungarian Minister for Human Capacities, Mr Zoltán Balog. With the letter, ALLEA joins a multitude of scientific institutions from Hungary and all over the world in voicing grave concerns regarding the proposed change in legislation of Act CCIV of 2011 on National Higher Education of the Hungarian Government which would deprive the Central European University (CEU) of itsability to operate according to fundamental scientific principles such as academic freedom, scientific excellence and self-governance. CEU is a Budapest-based prestigious US-Hungarian private university with international reputation which just recently celebrated its 25th anniversary.

“We consider the proposed legislation a fundamental threat to basic and internationally valid principles for conducting science and research”

ALLEA President, Günter Stock

 

The Hungarian National Assembly deliberates on the legislative proposal on Tuesday 4 April 2017. In case of its passing it would eventually lead to a forced discontinuation of CEU’s activities in its present form in Hungary. An official CEU statement calls the proposed legislation “discriminatory and unacceptable”. The amendments would prevent CEU to operate as a “free and independent international graduate university”. The CEU President urged the Hungarian government “to enter into negotiationswith us to find a satisfactory way forward that allows CEU to continue in Budapest and to maintain the academic freedoms essential to its operation”.

CEU has started a petition directed to the Hungarian National Assembly and Government which in the past few days was signed by almost 40.000 individuals.  The petition calls on the Hungarian National Assembly to “drop the proposed legislation and to enter into negotiations with the leadership of CEU that will ultimately allow this prestigious university to remain a proud contributor to scientific discourse in Hungary”.

Click here to read ALLEA’s letter.

Click here to join the petition.

To read further and updated information and to learn how to support CEU via social media support please click here.