Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize

The 2018 award winners
(from left): Anthony Cerami , David Wallach and Tim J. Schulz during the press conference in Frankfurt am Main

The Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize has been awarded every year for pioneering research in medical science since 1952 - after the merger of two previously separate prizes. The award is endowed with 120,000 euros. It is traditionally awarded in the Paulskirche in Frankfurt on March 14th, the birthday of Paul Ehrlich . The prize is also named after the chemist and science historian Ludwig Darmstaedter .

The award is given to scientists with outstanding achievements from home and abroad in the medical fields worked on by Paul Ehrlich. In particular, these are immunology , cancer research , hematology , microbiology and experimental and clinical chemotherapy .

The prize awarded by the Paul Ehrlich Foundation is one of the most highly endowed and internationally renowned prizes awarded in the field of medicine in Germany. Numerous later Nobel Prize winners were among the prize winners . Half of the prize is financed by the German Federal Ministry of Health , the second half is financed from corporate donations.

Since 2006, the Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Young Talent Prize has also been awarded to people aged 40 or under for outstanding achievements in the field of biomedical research in Germany. This prize is endowed with up to 60,000 euros; the prize money must be used entirely for research purposes.

Foundation, endowment

Hedwig Ehrlich, Paul Ehrlich's widow, donated 90,000 marks to the Association of Friends and Supporters of Frankfurt University in the 1920s for a Paul Ehrlich fund, which was established on July 13, 1929, 14 years after Paul Ehrlich's death, in the Paul Ehrlich Foundation was transferred. Since then, the foundation's assets have been held in trust by the Association of Friends and Supporters. A Paul Ehrlich Prize was then awarded from 1930 to 1934, but it was initially discontinued as a result of National Socialism ; the foundation also had to cease its activities. When the Paul Ehrlich Foundation resumed its activities in 1952, the Board of Trustees and the Board of Directors of the Chemotherapeutic Research Institute Georg-Speyer-Haus Foundation decided to combine the Paul Ehrlich Prize and the Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize under the umbrella of the Paul Ehrlich Foundation.

Award winners

Prize winners 1952 to 1960

year	Surname	Institution, place
1952	Gerhard Eissner	Federal Research Institute for Virus Diseases in Animals in Tübingen , Germany
1952	Wolf-Helmut Wagner	Nonnenhorn , Germany
1953	Adolf Butenandt	Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry in Munich , Germany
1954	Ernst Boris Chain	Imperial College London in London , United Kingdom
1956	Gerhard Domagk	IG Farben in Elberfeld , Germany
1958	Richard Kuhn	Max Planck Institute for Medical Research in Heidelberg , Germany
1960	Felix Michael Haurowitz	Indiana University in Bloomington (Indiana) , Indiana

Prize winners from 1961 to 1970

year	Surname	Institution, place
1961	Albert Hewett Coons	Boston , Massachusetts
	Günther Heymann	Paul Ehrlich Institute in Langen , Germany
	Örjan Ouchterlony	Gothenburg , Sweden
	Jacques Oudin	Paris , France
1962	Otto Heinrich Warburg	Max Planck Institute for Cell Physiology in Berlin , Germany
1963	Helmut Holzer	Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg in Freiburg im Breisgau , Germany
	Lothar Jaenicke	University of Cologne in Cologne , Germany
	Detlev Kayser	Berlin , Germany
	Tullio Terranova	Rome , Italy
1964	Fritz Kauffmann	Copenhagen , Denmark
1965	Otto Lüderitz	Max Planck Institute for Immunobiology in Freiburg im Breisgau , Germany
	Leon Le Minor	Paris , France
	Ida Ørskov	Copenhagen , Denmark
	Frits Ørskov	Copenhagen , Denmark
	Bruce AD Stocker	Stanford University in Stanford , California
1966	Francis Peyton Rous	Rockefeller University in New York City , New York
1967	Wilhelm Bernhard	Institut de Recherche Scientifique sur le Cancer in Villejuif , France
1967	Renato Dulbecco	Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla , California
1968	Walter Morgan	London , UK
1968	Otto Westphal	Montreux , Switzerland
1969	Hiroshi Nikaidō	Boston , Massachusetts
	Anne-Marie Staub	Paris , France
	Winifred Watkins	London , UK
1970	Ernst Ruska	Free University of Berlin in Berlin , Germany
1970	Helmut Ruska	Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf in Düsseldorf , Germany

Award winners from 1971 to 1980

year	Surname	Institution, place
1971	Albert Claude	Université libre de Bruxelles in Brussels , Belgium
	Keith R. Porter	University of Colorado at Boulder , Colorado
	Fritiof Sjöstrand	University of California in Los Angeles , California
1972	Denis Parsons Burkitt	London , United Kingdom / Uganda
1972	Jan Waldenström	Malmö Allmänna sjukhus (Malmö General Hospital) in Malmö , Sweden
1973	Anthony Epstein	University of Bristol in Bristol , United Kingdom
	Kimishige Ishizaka	Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore , Maryland
	Dennis H. Wright	University of Southampton in Southampton , United Kingdom
1974	James L. Gowans	University of Oxford in Oxford , United Kingdom
1974	Jacques Miller	Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne , Australia
1975	George B. Mackaness	Trudeau Institute in Saranac Lake , New York
	Avrion Mitchison	University College in London , United Kingdom
	Morten Simonsen	University of Copenhagen in Copenhagen , Denmark
1976	Georges Barski	Institut Gustave Roussy in Villejuif , France
1976	Boris Ephrussi	Center national de la recherche scientifique in Gif-sur-Yvette , France
1977	Torbjörn Caspersson	Karolinska Institute in Stockholm , Sweden
1977	John Gurdon	University of Cambridge in Cambridge , United Kingdom
1978	Ludwik Gross	Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City , New York
1978	Werner Schäfer	Max Planck Institute for Virus Research in Tübingen , Germany
1979	Arnold Graffi	Central Institute for Cancer Research , Berlin-Buch , German Democratic Republic
	Otto Mühlbock	University of Amsterdam in Amsterdam , Netherlands
	Wallace P. Rowe	National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in Bethesda , Maryland
1980	Tomoichiro Akiba	Saitama , Japan
1980	Hamao Umezawa	Tokyo University in Tokyo , Japan

Prize winners 1981 to 1990

year	Surname	Institution, place
1981	Stanley Falkow	University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle , Washington
1981	Susumu Mitsuhashi	Gunma University in Maebashi , Japan
1982	Niels Kaj Jerne	Castillon-du-Gard , France
1983	Peter Doherty	Australian National University in Canberra , Australia
	Michael Potter	National Institutes of Health in Bethesda , Maryland
	Rolf Zinkernagel	University Hospital Zurich in Zurich , Switzerland
1984	Piet Borst	Nederlands Kanker Instituut in Amsterdam , Netherlands
1984	George AM Cross	Rockefeller University in New York City , New York
1985	Ernest Bueding	Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore , Maryland
	Louis H. Miller	National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in Bethesda , Maryland
	Ruth Sunday nut branch	New York University in New York City , New York
1986	Abner Louis Notkins	National Institute of Dental Research in Bethesda , Maryland
1987	Jean-François Borel	Sandoz in Basel , Switzerland
	Hugh McDevitt	Stanford University School of Medicine in Stanford , California
	Felix Milgrom	University at Buffalo , The State University of New York in Buffalo , New York
1988	Peter K. Vogt	University of Southern California in Los Angeles , California
1989	Stuart A. Aaronson	National Cancer Institute in Bethesda , Maryland
	Russell F. Doolittle	University of California, San Diego in La Jolla , California
	Thomas Graf	European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg , Germany
1990	R. John Collier	Harvard Medical School in Boston , Massachusetts
1990	Alwin M. Pappenheimer , Jr.	Harvard University in Cambridge , Massachusetts

Prize winners 1991 to 2000

year	Surname	Institution, place	Reason for awarding the prize
1991	Rino Rappuoli	University of Siena in Siena , Italy
1991	Michio Ui	Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Medical Science in Tokyo , Japan
1992	Manfred Eigen	Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry , Göttingen , Germany
1993	Philippa Marrack	University of Colorado Denver and Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Denver , Colorado
	John W. Kappler
	Harald von Boehmer	Basel Institute for Immunology in Basel , Switzerland
1994	Peter Howley	Harvard Medical School in Boston , Massachusetts
1994	Harald zur Hausen	German Cancer Research Center , Heidelberg , Germany
1995	Stanley Prusiner	University of California, San Francisco in San Francisco , California
1996	Pamela J. Bjorkman	California Institute of Technology in Pasadena , California
	Hans-Georg Rammenee	German Cancer Research Center , Heidelberg , Germany
	Jack L. Strominger	Harvard University in Cambridge , Massachusetts
1997	Barry Marshall	University of Virginia at Charlottesville , Virginia
1997	John Robin Warren	Royal Perth Hospital in Perth , Australia
1998	David P. Lane	University of Dundee in Dundee , Scotland
	Arnold J. Levine	Princeton University in Princeton , New Jersey
	Bert Vogelstein	Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore , Maryland
1999	Robert Gallo	University System of Maryland in Baltimore , Maryland	"... for his discovery of human exogenous retroviruses ."
2000	H. Robert Horvitz	Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge , Massachusetts	In recognition of her contribution to the discovery of apoptosis .
2000	John FR Kerr	University of Queensland in Brisbane , Australia

Prize winners 2001 to 2010

The award of the Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize 2005 to Ian Wilmut was not without controversy, especially since the federal government, which co-financed half of the prize, had spoken out in favor of a cloning ban in the UN General Assembly.

year	Surname	institution	Reason for awarding the prize
2001	Stephen C. Harrison	Harvard University in Cambridge , Massachusetts	"... for her groundbreaking work on deciphering the three-dimensional structure of virus proteins ."
2001	Michael Rossmann	Purdue University in West Lafayette , Indiana
2002	Craig Venter	J. Craig Venter Institute, Rockville , Maryland	"... for the discovery and establishment of the automated sequencing of cDNA libraries and for the sequencing of various organisms - from the smallest microbes to humans."
2003	Richard A. Lerner	Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla , California	“... for the proof that the antibodies generated by the immune system can be adapted to any chemical functions as enzyme-like reaction mediators . A large number of enzyme-like reaction mechanisms could be elucidated in detail in this way. "
2003	Peter G. Schultz	Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla , California
2004	Tak Wah Mak	University of Toronto in Toronto , Canada	“... for their discoveries on the specificity and function of the so-called T-cell receptor . "
2004	Mark Davis	Stanford University in Stanford , California
2005	Ian Wilmut	University of Edinburgh in Edinburgh , Scotland	"... for his groundbreaking experiments that led to the cloning of a mammal."
2006	Craig Mello	Howard Hughes Medical Institute and University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester , Massachusetts	"... for the discovery of so-called non-coding double-stranded siRNAs (small interfering ribonuclein acid), also known as mediators of RNA interference (RNAi)."
2006	Andrew Z. Fire	School of Medicine at Stanford University in Stanford , California
2007	Ada Yonath	Weizmann Institute for Science in Rechovot , Israel	"... for their outstanding contributions to the elucidation of the three-dimensional structure of ribosomes - the complex cell organelles on which protein biosynthesis takes place."
2007	Harry Noller	University of California, Santa Cruz in Santa Cruz , California
2008	Tim Mosmann	University of Rochester in Rochester , New York	“... for his outstanding contributions in the field of immunology. ... Tim Mosmann's research has led to the discovery of two subtypes of helper T-lymphocytes , Th1 and Th2 cells, and has enabled new insights into the disease mechanism of infectious diseases and allergies. "
2009	Elizabeth Blackburn	University of California, Berkeley in Berkeley , California	"... for their outstanding research achievements in the discovery of telomeres and telomerase and elucidation of their importance for cell division and cell aging."
2009	Carol W. Greider	Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore , Maryland
2010	Charles Dinarello	University of Colorado School of Medicine in Denver , Colorado .	"... for his outstanding research achievements in the field of cytokines ."

Award winner since 2011

year	Surname	institution	Reason for awarding the prize
2011	Cesare Montecucco	University of Padua in Padua , Italy	"... for his outstanding research achievements in the field of pathogenic diseases such as tetanus ."
2012	Peter Walter	University of California, San Francisco in San Francisco , USA	"... for his outstanding research achievements in the field of cell biology ", especially for the discovery of the signal recognition particles .
2013	Mary-Claire King	University of Washington in Seattle , USA	"... for discovering that there is a genetic disposition for breast cancer."
2014	Michael Reth	Institute for Biology III at the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg , Germany	“... for his outstanding research achievements in the field of antibody research. He showed how the B cells of the immune system are activated and made to produce antibodies. "
2015	James P. Allison	MD Anderson Cancer Center, University of Texas , USA	"... for their pioneering work on immunotherapy against cancer . [...] James Allison is a pioneer of checkpoint inhibition for the treatment of advanced melanoma , Carl June developed the CART-19 therapy for leukemia . "
2015	Carl H. June	Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania , USA
2016	Emmanuelle Charpentier	Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology , Berlin , and Umeå University , Sweden	“... for their work that led to the development of the programmable gene scissors CRISPR-Cas9 . These gene scissors are part of the bacterial immune system. "
2016	Jennifer Doudna	University of California , Berkeley , USA
2017	Yuan Chang	University of Pittsburgh , USA	"... for your work on tumor viruses ."
2017	Patrick S. Moore	University of Pittsburgh, USA	"... for your work on tumor viruses ."
2018	Anthony Cerami	Araim Pharmaceuticals, Tarrytown, New York State	“For their research on the messenger substance TNF and its effect on inflammation”.
2018	David Wallach	The Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot
2019	Franz-Ulrich Hartl	Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry, Munich	"... for her fundamental work on protein folding ."
2019	Arthur Horwich	Yale University and Howard Hughes Medical Institute	"... for her fundamental work on protein folding ."
2020	Shimon Sakaguchi	Osaka University, Japan	"... for the discovery of regulatory T cells."
2021	Michael R. Silverman	Agouron Institute	"... for discoveries about bacterial communication."
2021	Bonnie L. Bassler	Princeton University	"... for discoveries about bacterial communication."
2022	Katalin Karikó	University of Pennsylvania	"... Research and development of messenger RNA (mRNA) for preventive and therapeutic purposes."
	Özlem Türeci	BioNTech
	Ugur Sahin	BioNTech

Young Prize Winner

The Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Young Talent Prize has been awarded since 2006. The recipients must not have reached the age of 40 and must have achieved excellent results in the field of biomedical research in Germany. The prize money is up to 60,000 euros and must be used for research purposes.

Award winner since 2006

2006: Ana Martin-Villalba , DKFZ Heidelberg, for her "fundamental and internationally acclaimed contributions to the role of the CD95 signal system for physiological and pathophysiological processes in the nervous system ".
2007: Michael Schindler , Ulm University , for his "internationally acclaimed work on the Nef protein and its importance for the development of AIDS ".
2008: Eckhard Lammert , research group leader at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden , for his "outstanding biochemical work in the field of diabetes research".
2009: Falk Nimmerjahn , Laboratory for Experimental Immunology and Immunotherapy at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg , for his "outstanding work in the field of immunology ".
2010: Amparo Acker-Palmer , professor at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main , for her work on “Parallels in the network formation of nerve cells and blood vessels ”.
2011: Stephan Grill , research group leader at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics and at the Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems in Dresden, for his "contributions in the field of cell biology ".
2012: Kathrin Mädler , head of the Laboratory for Molecular Diabetology at the Center for Biomolecular Interactions at the University of Bremen , "for her innovative and new approaches to understanding apoptotic processes in the development of type 2 diabetes ."
2013: James Poulet , Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine Berlin "for research into how the brain processes sensory perceptions that trigger behavior and lead to precise movements."
2014: Andrea Ablasser , University of Bonn , "for her research into how the immune system (the innate immune system ) recognizes viruses and bacteria."
2015: Raja Atreya , University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, "for a new type of diagnostic agent that can be used to predict whether patients with Crohn's disease will benefit from therapy with a TNF-α antagonist."
2016: Claus-Dieter Kuhn , University of Bayreuth , "for his work with ribonucleic acids, which are not translated into proteins, but take on other tasks in the control of cellular processes."
2017: Volker Busskamp , Center for Regenerative Therapies Dresden (CRTD), for his connection of "nerve cells to artificial circuits in the Petri dish" and his approaches to gene therapy for retinitis pigmentosa .
2018: Tim J. Schulz , German Institute for Nutritional Research , for his work on white and brown fat cells .
2019: Dorothee Dormann , Ludwig Maximilians University Munich , for her work on the causes of severe neurodegenerative diseases.
2020: Judith Reichmann , European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, for demonstrating why mouse embryos sometimes have the wrong number of chromosomes or have more than one nucleus per cell.
2021: Elvira Mass , University of Bonn , for work on the importance of specialized immune cells from the yolk sac that help the development of organs.