Laureates receive NWO-Spinoza Prize

Today in the Nieuwe Kerk in The Hague, the State Secretary for Education, Culture and Science Sander Dekker (OCW) and NWO chairman Jos Engelen will award the Spinoza Prizes to the four laureates. Organic chemist René Janssen, religious studies scholar Birgit Meyer, statistician Aad van der Vaart and human genetics professor Cisca Wijmenga will receive the prize.

The winners of the Spinoza Prize will each receive € 2.5 million, which they can use as they see fit for research purposes. Dekker and Engelen will present a bronze statuette of the Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677). The statuette is the symbol of the prize.

The NWO Spinoza Prize is a personal award for top researchers with international reputations. NWO requests selected persons to nominate candidates for this prize. A maximum of four prizes are awarded annually. The prize is an honorary award for what the winners have achieved in their scientific career and an encouragement to continue doing excellent research. In essence the prize works as an impulse for scientific research in the Netherlands.