The IRP Schellenberg Research Prize, endowed with CHF 100,000, was awarded in equal parts to Prof. Dr. Claire Jacob, University of Fribourg (Switzerland), and Prof. Dr. Magdalena Götz, Helmholtz Zentrum München (Germany).
With the biennial research award, the IRP Foundation aims to recognize exceptional researchers in the field of paraplegia. Primarily young but already recognized and successful scientists working experimentally in this field of research are awarded. The prize money will help hire additional staff, purchase supplies and explore new avenues that will contribute to progress in spinal cord regeneration and functional recovery.
Unanimous vote
The five-member IRP research jury unanimously selected Prof. Jacob and Prof. Götz as this year’s award winners. Prof. Jacob, who is French, earned two doctorates in France, pharmacology and biomedical sciences, before taking up two postdoctoral positions in America and Zurich. Since her stay in Zurich, she has been fascinated by research in the field of the peripheral nervous system, especially Schwann cells. In 2012, she received a research grant from the Swiss National Science Foundation and the Marie Heim Vögtlin Prize. The IRP Foundation already supported her project on nervous system plasticity in 2014. In October 2019, she will start part-time as a professor in cell neurobiology at Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz, Germany.
Neurobiologist Prof. Götz is honored for her developmental biology research on the reprogramming of glial cells into neurons. She is director of the Institute of Stem Cell Research at Helmholtz Zentrum München, as well as chair of the Institute of Physiological Genomics at the Biomedical Center of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich. Prof. Götz’s long-term goal is to develop new treatment options for patients whose diseases are based on damaged nerve cells. She has received numerous awards, including the Federal Cross of Merit with Ribbon and an Advanced Grant from the European Research Council.
IRP – International Foundation for Research in Paraplegia
Lake road 19, 8002 Zurich
www.irp.ch
HAUSARZT PRAXIS 2018; 13(10): 6
