Nominations for 2023 WLA Prize kicks off

Nominations for the 2023 World Laureates Association Prize (WLA Prize) can now be done through the website www.thewlaprize.org.

The WLA Prize, an international science prize by the World Laureates Association, is awarded annually and features two categories: "Computer Science or Mathematics" and "Life Science or Medicine." The total award for each prize, which may be divided among up to four laureates, is 10 million yuan ($1.45 million).

Nominators are encouraged to summit their nominations through the prize's official website before the nomination deadline on June 15, Beijing time, said the prize's management committee. Announcement for the 2023 WLA Prize laureates is scheduled to take place in late August or early September. This will be followed by a grand award ceremony during the sixth WLA Forum in Shanghai in November, the committee said.

Unveiled at the fourth WLA Forum on Nov 1, 2021, the WLA Prize is aimed at supporting global science and technology advancement, addressing the challenges faced by humanity, and promoting society's long-term progress, according to the managing committee.

The WLA Prize, which "contributes to all the missions of WLA: advocacy for basic science, as well as support for young scientists and international cooperation," is set to become one of the world's most influential awards, said Roger Kornberg, the 2006 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry and the chairman of the WLA and the WLA Prize Management Committee.

Neil Shen, Founding and Managing Partner of Sequoia China, the sole sponsor of the WLA Prize, said the prize is expected to "help create a more vibrant and inclusive ecosystem for scientific research, and encourage scientists to explore the uncharted territories and find their 'eureka moment'."

The inaugural WLA Prize, presented during the fifth WLA Forum on Nov 6, 2022, was awarded to Michael I. Jordan, a world-leading researcher in the field of statistical machine learning, and German biochemist Dirk Gorlich.