International Prizefor

BIOLOGY

Committee on the International Prize for Biology
Japan Society for the Promotion of ScienceFrom Japan to the WorldWorking toward the further progressof biological sciences

The International Prize for Biology was established in 1985 to commemorate theOverview of International Prize for Biology

PurposeWhile paying tribute to the long-sustained research endeavors of Their Majesties,
Emperor Showa and the Emperor Emeritus, the International Prize for Biology gives
prestigious recognition to biologists around the world who have made superlative
contributions to advancing their fields of biological science.

Establishment

The Prize was established in April 1985 to accede to a fervent desire voiced bybiological scientists and others to create an international award to recognize the work ofleading scientists in “systematic biology and taxonomy” and other fields of fundamental
biology. In establishing the Prize, a dedicated effort was made by a consortium oforganizations including the Ministry of Education, Science and Culture, The Japan
Academy, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Zoological Society of Japan and
Botanical Society of Japan. Also helping greatly to realize the desire of biologicalscientists to create an international prize were many individuals and associations who
made generous financial contributions.

Prize Committee
and Secretariat

The Committee on the International Prize for Biology comprises up to 40 members,
who choose the committee chair. Operating under the Prize Committee are two
sub-committees: a selection committee and finance committee. The secretariat for thePrize is situated in the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.

Recipients

The Prize is awarded to researchers who have made exceptional contributions to
the advancement of fundamental biology.

FieldsThe branch of biology for which the Prize is awarded is chosen each year by the Prize
Committee.

Selection Process

The selection committee invites the nomination of candidates from relevant
individuals and organizations in Japan and abroad. The selection committee, then,screens the nominated candidates and forwards the top candidates to the Prize
Committee along with supporting statements. The Prize Committee makes the final
selection of each year’s recipient.

Presentation
Ceremony

The Prize is presented every year in a dedicated ceremony. The Prize consistingof a certificate, medal and purse of 10 million yen is given to the recipient. In
conjunction with the ceremony, an international symposium is held in which thePrize recipient is invited to give a special lecture.

Prize Fund

A Prize Fund is established for accepting and managing donated money. It is
operated by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.

Imperial Gift

Through the 34th ceremony of the International Prize for Biology, the imperial
gift was presented to the awardee by the Emperor. It has been presented by the Crown
Prince since the 35th ceremony.

sixty-year reign of Emperor Showa and his long devotion to biological research. It also
pays tribute to His Majesty the Emperor Emeritus, who has labored for many years toadvance the taxonomical study of gobioid fish, while striving continuously to elevatethe international stature of the Prize.
Each year, the International Prize for Biology is conferred upon a distinguishedresearcher in a field selected by the Prize Committee from among all the fields of
biology. Based on nominations gathered from around the world, the Prize is awarded toa biologist judged to have a superlative record of achievements in the subject field. Once
every decade, “systematic biology and taxonomy” is selected for the Prize as it is the field
in which, like Emperor Showa before him, His Majesty the Emperor Emeritus has
conducted research over many years.
So as to spread global recognition of the International Prize for Biology as a tributeto excellent achievement while accelerating the advancement of biology, the Prize
Committee asks for your sustained cooperation and support.

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Achievements of Emperor Showa in Biology

Achievements of the Emperor Emeritus in Biology

As a biologist, Emperor Showa

Making time between his official duties, the Emperor Emeritus has over many years pursued adevoted himself for many years totaxonomical study of fish in the suborder Gobioidei. Between 1963 and the present, he publishedresearch in the systematics of hydroids

a total of 28 original papers on this research in journals of the Ichthyological Society of Japan.

collected from Sagami Bay along withFor example, of the three known Japanese species of the genus Cristatogobius (family Gobiidae)—studies he carried out on other marine

the Kuro-tosakahaze, Tosakahaze, and Hime-tosakahaze—the latter two were known only by theiranimals, seaweeds and myxomycetes.

Japanese common names, as their scientific names had been undetermined. As a result of his studies ofHe also conducted studies of plants

these three species of Cristatogobius, the Emperor Emeritus identified the Tosakahaze as Cristatogobius

in Japan’s Nasu and Suzaki areas.

lophius Herre and described the Hime-tosakahaze as a new species, Cristatogobius aurimaculatus.

The Emperor was known as one of

He also coauthored a paper that estimated the evolutionary process in gobioid fishes using mitochondrial

the world authorities on hydroids,

DNA and that compared those findings with phylogenetic relationships based on morphology. This study

for which his research was highly

appeared in Gene, an international journal on genetics published in the Netherlands.

acclaimed having described for the

For his work in ichthyological research, the Emperor Emeritus was invited in 1980 to become afirst time two genera of thecate

foreign member of the Linnean Society of London, whose membership numbers less than fifty. Then in

Clathrozonidae, Clathrozoon wilsoni

Emperor Showa in Imperial Biological Laboratory

1986, he was elected as an honorary member of the Society. He is also an honorary associate of theand Pseudoclathrozoon cryptolarioides

Australian Museum, an honorary member of the Zoological Society of London, and a permanentgen. et sp. nov.. He was able to succeed in describing these genera by keeping colonies of them alive in his

honorary member of the Research Institute for Natural Science of Argentina. In 1998, he became thebiological laboratory at the Imperial Palace.

first recipient of the King Charles Second Medal, awarded by the Royal Society of London to heads ofOver a period of many years, the Emperor also collected numerous specimens of opisthobranchs,

state who have made outstanding contributions to the advancement of science.

sea stars, crustaceans, and other marine creatures from the tide pools and shallows of Sagami Bay.

In 1992 when the American journal Science published a special issue on Japan, the editors

Collaborating researchers in a variety fields have conducted studies and written critiques on theserequested the Emperor Emeritus to contribute an article titled “Early Cultivators of Science in Japan.”

specimens, which are published as literature of the Imperial Biology Laboratory. Also interested in

In 2007, he presented the keynote lecture, titled “Linné and Taxonomy in Japan,” at the Linnean

botany, the Emperor coauthored a number of books on studies he made of the flora in Nasu and Suzaki

Society of London, marking the 300th anniversary of Carl von Linné’s birth. An excerpt of that lecture

as well as on the grounds of the Imperial Palace.

was published in the British scientific journal Nature.

Medal of the International Prize for Biology
The medal of the International Prize
for Biology bears an abstract design
based on part of a colony of Clathrozonidae, namely the species Pseudoclathrozoon
cryptolarioides described by Emperor
Showa.
Designer: YOSHIDA Sagenji(Professor Emeritus, Tokyo National
University of Fine Arts and Music)
Pseudoclathrozoon cryptolarioides →Imperial Gift until the 34th presentation ceremony,a silver vase bearing the imperial crest

The Emperor Emeritus conducting research on gobioid fishes

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4Research fields and Recipients

Developmental Biology

The Prize is awarded each year to a researcher who has madean exceptional contribution to the advancement of biological sciences.
Each year’s branch of biology is selected by the Prize Committee. The Prize is awarded to a biologist inrecognition of his/her lofty scientific achievements in the subject field. Each year, candidates for thePrize are solicited and screened by the selection committee, with the recipient chosen by the Prize
Committee. To date, the following distinguished scientists have been awarded the Prize.

We Homo sapiens start life as a single fertilized egg in our mother’s womb, and by the time we are born our bodies have a complex
structure complete with organs such as the brain, lungs, and digestive tract. Other animals and plants—even fungi, if they are
multicellular—also generally start life as a zygote (like the fertilized egg), which becomes an embryo through cell division; as the cells
continue to divide, they differentiate and become organized into the structures and morphology of the adult form. The study of theprocesses and mechanisms involved in the adult’s formation is known as developmental biology. In the 19th century, biologists madecomparative studies of embryo morphology between different organisms. Research reached the molecular level—genes and proteins—when the techniques of molecular biology were introduced in the 20th century, and this led to discovery of the homeobox genes, which
direct development. Dr. John Gurdon, the third recipient of the International Prize for Biology, shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology
or Medicine in 2012 with Dr. Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University, who produced iPS cells.

3rd Prize (1987, Research field: Developmental Biology)
The List of Recipients
1985 (1st)Dr. Edred John Henry Corner

Recipient1998 (14th)

1986 (2nd)Dr. Peter Hamilton Raven
Systematic Biology
and Taxonomy

1987 (3rd)

Dr. John Bertrand Gurdon
Developmental Biology→ P61988 (4th)Dr. Motoo Kimura
Population Biology

1989 (5th)Dr. Eric James Denton
Marine Biology

1990 (6th)Dr. Masakazu Konishi
Behavioral Biology

1991 (7th)1999 (15th)
2000 (16th)

Comparative Physiology
and Biochemistry

1993 (9th)1994 (10th)

Dr. Edward Osborne Wilson

2001 (17th)

Paleontology

2002 (18th)

Biology of Evolution

2003 (19th)

Dr. Shinya Inoué

2004 (20th)

Dr. Thomas Cavalier-Smith
Systematic Biology
and Taxonomy→ P72005 (21st)Dr. Nam-Hai Chua
Structural Biology
in Fine Structure,
Morphology and Morphogenesis

Dr. Ryuzo Yanagimachi
Dr. Elliot Martin Meyerowitz
Plant Science

Chronobiology

Dr. David Swenson Hogness

2013 (29th)

Dr. George David Tilman
Ecology2009 (25th)

Dr. Winslow Russell Briggs
Biology of Sensing

2010 (26th)

Dr. Nancy Ann Moran
Biology of Symbiosis→ P7

Achievements
recognizedby the Award

Dr. Joseph Felsenstein
Biology of Evolution

2014 (30th)2015 (31st)

Dr. Yoshinori Ohsumi
Cell Biology→ P82016 (32nd) Dr. Stephen Philip Hubbell
Biology of Biodiversity

2017 (33rd)

Dr. Rita Rossi Colwell
Marine Biology

2018 (34th)

Ecology
How organisms live in their natural environment is called their ecology; this is also the name of the branch ofscience that studies the way they live. Ecologists study how organisms live and interact with their environment,
being influenced by it and influencing it in their turn. The state of an ecosystem—the complex formed by acommunity of organisms and their environment—is not easy to grasp because, among other reasons, theenvironment is not circumscribed like a forest or a lake, and there are complex relationships among predators andprey. Recently, ecology has been gaining in importance as biodiversity is increasingly threatened by global
warming and the spread of invasive species.

Dr. Andrew Herbert Knoll
Paleontology

2019 (35th)

Dr. Naomi Ellen Pierce

9th Prize (1993，Research field: Ecology)

Biology of Insects

2020 (36th)

Dr. Kazuo Shinozaki

Recipient

Dr. Timothy Douglas White
Biology of Human Evolution

2022 (38th)

Dr. Katsumi Tsukamoto
Biology of Fishes

2023 (39th)

Dr. Richard Durbin
Biology of Genomes

Dr. Edward Osborne Wilson
Professor and Curator in Entomology Museum of Comparative Zoology,
Harvard University, USA
Date of Birth: 10 June 1929 Nationality: USA

Biology ofEnvironmental Responses

2021 (37th)

By injecting the nucleus of another cell into the cytoplasm of an egg, using
amphibians, Dr. Gurdon was the first to show that even the nucleus of a fully
differentiated cell can be “initialized” so that it repeats its development,
becoming a larva and eventually even a parent. His work exerted a major
impact on the advancement of developmental biology, cellular engineering,and the biological sciences as a whole.

Dr. Peter Crane
Systematic Biology
and Taxonomy

Genetics

2008 (24th)

Dr. Joseph Altman
Neurobiology→ P8

Cell Biology

2007 (23rd)

Dr. Ian Read Gibbons

2012 (28th)

John Humphrey Plummer Professor of Cell Biology,
University of Cambridge, UK
Date of Birth: 2 October 1933 Nationality: United Kingdom

Dr. Eric Harris Davidson
Developmental Biology

Dr. Masatoshi Nei

Dr. Ernst Mayr

Biology of Reproduction

1997 (13th)

Dr. Harry B. Whittington

2006 (22nd) Dr. Serge Daan

Cell Biology

1996 (12th)

Dr. Seymour Benzer

Ecology→ P6
Systematic Biology
and Taxonomy

1995 (11th)

Dr. Setsuro Ebashi

Developmental Biology

Dr. Marshall Davidson Hatch
Dr. Knut Schmidt-Nielsen

2011 (27th)

Animal Physiology

Functional Biology of Plants

1992 (8th)Dr. Otto Thomas Solbrig
The Biology of Biodiversity

Taxonomy or Systematic Biology

Dr. John Bertrand Gurdon

Achievements
recognizedby the Award

Dr. Wilson’s studies on ants, taking ecological, biogeographical, and behavioral
approaches, have yielded a wealth of new knowledge in such areas as community
structure, distribution, caste differentiation, and communication. Hisargument that understanding the social behavior of animals requires a synthesisof ecology, ethology (the study of behavior), and population genetics, and his
advocacy of social biology contributed greatly to the advancement of ecology
and the biological sciences as a whole.
*Please note that the affiliations of the recipients were current at the time of the award.

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Systematic Biology and Taxonomy

Neurobiology

The science of taxonomy groups living things so as to make their enormous diversity easier for humans to understand, while
systematic biology infers how these organisms evolved and traces their evolutionary history. We used to group organisms andinfer their evolutionary pathways according to their morphology (appearance). Since the 1980s, the ability to sequence
the DNA of genes and the amino acids of proteins has allowed us to utilize differences in the arrangements of these
biomolecules as clues to evolutionary pathways. Thus, biologists can now employ the common benchmark provided bybiomolecules to compare different organisms and shed light on the age-old processes of evolution. Emperor Showa pursued
evolutionary studies over many years, and His Majesty the present Emperor Akihito continues to do so. Accordingly, once
every ten years “systematic biology and taxonomy” is chosen as the field for the International Prize for Biology.

In order to survive, living creatures perceive changes in their environment using senses such as sight, hearing, taste,smell, and touch. The information obtained is carried to the brain for processing, as a result of which theorganism may take action or changes may occur in its body. The information is conducted there by the
nervous system, which developed as multicellular organisms evolved due to the need to transmit information
among the cells in order to permit coordinated functioning. Research into the brain, the center of the nervous
system, dates back to ancient Egypt, and sketches of microscopic observations of nerve cells were published as
early as 1865. The information processing system centered on the brain is highly complex, however, and there ismuch that we still do not understand.

20th Prize (2004, Research field: Systematic Biology and Taxonomy)

28th Prize (2012, Research field: Neurobiology)

Recipient

Dr. Thomas Cavalier-Smith

Dr. Joseph Altman

Recipient

Professor of Zoology, University of Oxford, UK
Date of Birth: 21 October 1942 Nationality: United Kingdom and Canada

Achievements
recognizedby the Award

Dr. Cavalier-Smith has published many works which organize and systematize theclassification of the living world, taking a bold yet detailed approach on the basis of his
special expertise in cell biology, electron microscopy, and molecular biology, backed byhis knowledge of the latest developments in every field of biological science. Focusing
on the evolution of cells by endosymbiosis, he has helped create a more naturalclassification system, primarily by proposing the “six kingdom theory,” which added the
kingdom Chromista to the five kingdoms (the Monera, Protista, Plantae, Fungi, andAnimalia) that had been generally accepted for some time.

Professor Emeritus, Purdue University, USA
Date of Birth: 7 October 1925 Nationality: USA

Achievements
recognizedby the Award

Biology of Symbiosis

Dr. Altman proved in the 1960s that neurons continue to be generated incertain areas of the adult mammalian brain. His discoveries, which werereaffirmed 30 years later, laid the foundations of a new field of medicine andbioscience which brings together neuroscience, stem cell biology, psychiatry,and neurology, thus contributing greatly to the advancement of the biologicalsciences as a whole.

Cell Biology

No biological organism can live without interacting in some way with other living things. The relationships that arise
between such partners vary. For example, when only one of the parties benefits, the relationship is known as“commensalism”; when both benefit, it is known as “mutualistic symbiosis.” And when one party benefits at theother’s expense, it is called “parasitism.” The more we learn about the complexity of relationships among living
things, however, the more difficult it becomes to distinguish between symbiosis and parasitism. The 1970s
saw the birth of endosymbiotic theory, which holds that in the course of evolution certain cells came to live
inside other cells. Also, symbionts influence each other’s evolution, and this “coevolution” is another area where
research is making progress.

Exactly when the genesis of life occurred remains unclear, but fossils of microorganisms have been found in
sedimentary rock from at least 3.5 billion years ago. Life at that time was unicellular, consisting of a single cell. Cells
eventually took on a structure with a membrane-surrounded nucleus and organelles such as the mitochondria, andmulticellular organisms followed. All life consists of cells, and our knowledge of the cell is the key to ourknowledge of life. Cells themselves are equipped with functions such as self-replication and metabolism, while inmulticellular organisms cells of the same kind come together to form tissues and perform various functions tomaintain life. Cell biology is the study of the structures and functions of cells. Dr. Ohsumi was later awarded theNobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2016.

26th Prize (2010, Research field: Biology of Symbiosis)

31st Prize (2015, Research field: Cell Biology)

Recipient

Dr. Nancy Ann Moran

Recipient

William H. Fleming Professor, Department of Ecology and
Evolutionary Biology, Yale University, USA
Date of Birth: 21 December 1954 Nationality: USA

Achievements
recognizedby the Award

Dr. Moran has contributed greatly to the advancement of the biology ofsymbiosis in recent years through her studies of intimate coevolutionary
relationships between insects and the endosymbiotic bacteria that live
within them, studies which have yielded by far the largest number ofoutstanding research results in this field thanks to Dr. Moran’s versatile
approach, which draws on molecular biology, genomics, and experimental
and theoretical biology.

Dr. Yoshinori Ohsumi
Honorary Professor, Frontier Research Center,
Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan
Date of Birth: 9 February 1945 Nationality: Japan

Achievements
recognizedby the Award

Dr. Ohsumi elucidated the key mechanisms of autophagy, which werecompletely unknown before his studies. He first identified and analyzed
multiple autophagy-related genes (ATG genes) in yeast. He establishedautophagy as an important research field in Cell Biology by elucidating its
key molecular mechanisms and by showing that it is an important life
phenomenon, widely conserved throughout the living world.

*Please note that the affiliations of the recipients were current at the time of the award.

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Process for Nominating and Selecting Recipients of the International Prize for Biology(In the case of the 38th Prize)

Around August

The Prize Committee selects the branch of biology for next year’s Prize.

The selection committee convenes to discuss the criteria for screening candidates.
Committee on the International Prize for Biology

From October

Selection Committee

From February
to mid-April

Call issued for candidate nominations
The selection committee invites nominations from universities,
research institutions and individual researchers involved in the subject year’s branch of biology.
Solicitations are made in both in Japan and abroad.

Review of candidates
From May

Donations

Selection Committee

A fund for the International Prize for Biology is establishedin the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, which manages the donated money.
To maintain and grow the Prize over the long term, donations are essential.
The Prize Committee invites your greatly appreciated contributions.
If you would like to donate to the Fund,
please download the form from our website at
http://www.jsps.go.jp/english/e-biol/03_donation.html ,email your donation form to the Secretariat,
and make a bank transfer using the account shown below.

The selection committee members assigned to screen the candidates are experts
in the subject field from Japan and abroad.

Committee on the International Prize for Biology

Around August

Around December

Decide upon recipient; Issue press release
The Prize recipient is chosen and his/her name is publicly announced.

Presentation Ceremony held at the Japan Academy in Tokyo
Commemorative Symposium for the International Prize for Biology
The presentation ceremony is held in the presence of
Their Imperial Highnesses Crown Prince and Crown Princess Akishino.
A Commemorative Symposium is held in conjunction with the ceremony.

Bank Account Information
Bank Name : Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation
Swift code : SMBCJPJT
Branch : Tokyo Public Institutions Operations Office
Branch Address : 18th floor, Nishi-shimbashi Square 3-1,
Nishishimbashi 1-chome, Minato-ku, Tokyo
105-0003, Japan
Account Type : Ordinary Account
Account Number : 3006718
Account Holder's Name : Japan Society for the Promotion of Science

Contact for inquiries
Secretariat of the International Prize for Biology
Japan Society for the Promotion of Science
5-3-1 Kojimachi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 102-0083, Japan
Email: ip-biology@jsps.go.jp

The Presentation Ceremony for the 2019 Prize（Recipient: Dr. Naomi Ellen Pierce ）Dr. Yoshinori Ohsumi (2015 recipient)With Their Majesties the Emperor and Empress at the reception

9Secretariat of the International Prize for Biology
Japan Society for the Promotion of Science
5-3-1 Kojimachi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 102-0083, Japan
Email: ip-biology@jsps.go.jp
URL: http://www.jsps.go.jp/english/e-biol/index.html

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