Academy announces two new science awards

The Australian Academy of Science has announced two new national awards for early- and mid-career researchers, named after pre-eminent scientists Sir Gustav Nossal and Jacques Miller. According to academy president Professor Andrew Holmes, Professors Nossal and Miller are “two living legends of Australian science”.

The Gustav Nossal Medal for Global Health is open to global health researchers up to 15 years post PhD. It recognises Sir Gustav’s substantial contributions to the fields of cellular immunology, antibody formation and tolerance and vaccine research science.

The Jacques Miller Medal for Experimental Biomedicine is meanwhile open to experimental biomedicine researchers up to 15 years post PhD. Professor Miller’s achievements include the discovery of the function of the thymus and the identification, in mammalian species, of the two major subsets of lymphocytes and their functions.

Both honorific awards were made possible by the generous donation of Sir Marc Feldmann, a Corresponding Member (international Fellow) of the academy and a prominent Australian immunologist based at the University of Oxford. Nominations are open until 24 September 2014.

“I hope these new medals will encourage our up-and-coming researchers in the fields of public health and biomedical sciences to aspire to similar heights of scientific endeavour,” said Professor Holmes.