Crafoord Prize

The **Crafoord Prize** is an annual science prize established in 1980 by Holger and Anna-Greta Crafoord. It is administered by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

The prize is for "international basic research in the disciplines Astronomy, Mathematics, Geosciences, and Biosciences, with particular emphasis on ecology, and rheumatoid arthritis" (the disease from which Holger severely suffered in his last years). According to the Academy, "these disciplines are chosen so as to complement those for which the Nobel Prizes are awarded."

Only one award is given each year, according to a rotating scheme – astronomy and mathematics; then geosciences; then biosciences. A Crafoord Prize is only awarded for arthritis when a committee decides that substantial progress in the field has been made. On Crafoord Day in April, the prize is presented by the King of Sweden, who also presents the Nobel Prize Awards at the ceremony in December. The prize is to fund further research by the prize winner. In 2012 it is US$600,000.

## Winners

|style="width:5%"|Year|style="width:11%"|Category|style="width=50px"|Image|style="width:21%"|Laureate|style="width:14%"|Nationality|style="width:55%"|Work|
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|rowspan=2|1982|rowspan=2|Mathematics||Vladimir Arnold||rowspan=2|Theory of non-linear differential equations||||
||Louis Nirenberg|||||||||||
|rowspan=2|1983|rowspan=2|Geosciences||Edward Lorenz||rowspan=2|Geophysical hydrodynamics||||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|Henry Stommel||||||||||
|1984|Biosciences||Daniel Janzen||Co-evolution|||||||
|1985|Astronomy||Lyman Spitzer||Studies of the interstellar medium|||||||
|rowspan=2|1986|rowspan=2|Geosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Claude Allègre||rowspan=2|Isotope geochemical relations|||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|Gerald J. Wasserburg||||||||||
|rowspan=2|1987|rowspan=2|Biosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Eugene P. Odum||rowspan=2|Ecosystem ecology|||
||Howard T. Odum|||||||||||
|rowspan=2|1988|rowspan=2|Mathematics||Pierre Deligne||rowspan=2|Algebraic geometry||||
||Alexander Grothendieck|None||||||||||
|1989|Geosciences||James Van Allen||Exploration of space, the discovery the Van Allen belts|||||||
|rowspan=2|1990|rowspan=2|Biosciences||Paul R. Ehrlich||Dynamics and genetics of fragmented populations|||||
|||E.O. Wilson||Theory of island biogeography||||||||
|1991|Astronomy||Allan Rex Sandage||Study of galaxies|||||||
|1992|Geosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Adolf Seilacher||Research into evolution of life||||||
|rowspan=2|1993|rowspan=2|Biosciences||W.D. Hamilton||Theories of kin selection and genetic relationship|||||
||Seymour Benzer||Genetical and neurophysiological studies of fruit flies|||||||||
|rowspan=2|1994|rowspan=2|Mathematics|style="text-align:center;"|—|Simon Donaldson||Four-dimensional geometry||||
||Shing-Tung Yau||Non-linear techniques in differential geometry|||||||||
|rowspan=2|1995|rowspan=2|Geosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Willi Dansgaard||rowspan=2|Development of isotope geological analysis methods|||
||Nicholas Shackleton|||||||||||
|1996|Biosciences||Robert M. May||Ecological research|||||||
|rowspan=2|1997|rowspan=2|Astronomy||Fred Hoyle||rowspan=2|Study of nuclear processes in stars, stellar evolution||||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|Edwin Salpeter||||||||||
|rowspan=2|1998|rowspan=2|Geosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Don L. Anderson||rowspan=2|Study of the structures and processes in the interior of the Earth|||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|Adam M. Dziewonski||||||||||
|rowspan=3|1999|rowspan=3|Biosciences||Ernst Mayr||rowspan=3|Developing the concept of evolutionary biology||||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|John Maynard Smith||||||||||
||George C. Williams|||||||||||
|rowspan=2|2000|rowspan=2|Polyarthritis|style="text-align:center;"|—|Marc Feldmann||rowspan=2|Definition of TNF-alpha|||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|Ravinder N. Maini||||||||||
|2001|Mathematics||Alain Connes||Theory of operator algebras, founder of the non-commutative geometry|||||||
|2002|Geosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Dan P. McKenzie||Dynamics of the lithosphere||||||
|2003|Biosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Carl Woese||Third domain of life||||||
|rowspan=2|2004|rowspan=2|Polyarthritis|style="text-align:center;"|—|Eugene C. Butcher||rowspan=2|Study of molecular mechanisms concerning white blood cells|||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|Timothy A. Springer||||||||||
|rowspan=3|2005|rowspan=3|Astronomy|style="text-align:center;"|—|James E. Gunn||rowspan=3|Understanding the large-scale structure of the Universe|||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|James Peebles||||||||||
||Martin Rees|||||||||||
|2006|Geosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Wallace S. Broecker||Research into the global carbon cycle||||||
|2007|Biosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Robert Trivers||Analysis of social evolution||||||
|rowspan=3|2008|Astronomy||Rashid Alievich Sunyaev||Contributions to high-energy astrophysics and cosmology||||||
|rowspan=2|Mathematics||Maxim Kontsevich||rowspan=2|Contributions to mathematics from modern theoretical physics||||||
||Edward Witten|||||||||||
|rowspan=3|2009|rowspan=3|Polyarthritis||Charles Dinarello||rowspan=3|Isolation of interleukins, understanding their role in the onset of inflammatory diseases||||
||Tadamitsu Kishimoto|||||||||||
||Toshio Hirano|||||||||||
|2010|Geosciences|style="text-align:center;"||Walter Munk||“for his pioneering and fundamental contributions to our understanding of ocean circulation, tides and waves, and their role in the Earth’s dynamics”.||||||
|2011|Biosciences|style="text-align:center;"||Ilkka Hanski||“for his pioneering studies on how spatial variation affects the dynamics of animal and plant populations”.||||||
|rowspan=4|2012|rowspan=2|Astronomy|style="text-align:center;"|—|Reinhard Genzel||rowspan=2|"for their observations of the stars orbiting the galactic centre, indicating the presence of a supermassive black hole".|||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|Andrea M. Ghez||||||||||
|rowspan=2|Mathematics|style="text-align:center;"|—|Jean Bourgain||rowspan=2|“for their brilliant and groundbreaking work in harmonic analysis, partial differential equations, ergodic theory, number theory, combinatorics, functional analysis and theoretical computer science".|||||
|style="text-align:center;"||Terence Tao||||||||||
|rowspan=3|2013|rowspan=3|Polyarthritis|style="text-align:center;"||Peter K. Gregersen||rowspan=3|"for their discoveries concerning the role of different genetic factors and their interactions with environmental factors in the pathogenesis, diagnosis and clinical management of rheumatoid arthritis".|rowspan=3 style="text-align: center;"||
|style="text-align:center;"||Lars Klareskog||||||||||
|style="text-align:center;"||Robert J. Winchester||||||||||
|2014|Geosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Peter Molnar||"for his ground-breaking contribution to the understanding of global tectonics, in particular the deformation of continents and the structure and evolution of mountain ranges, as well as the impact of tectonic processes on ocean-atmosphere circulation and climate".|style="text-align: center;"|||||
|rowspan=2|2015|rowspan=2|Biosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Richard Lewontin||rowspan=2|"for their pioneering analyses and fundamental contributions to the understanding of genetic polymorphism".|rowspan=2 style="text-align: center;"||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|Tomoko Ohta||||||||||
|rowspan=3|2016|rowspan=2|Astronomy|style="text-align:center;"||Roy Kerr||rowspan=2|"for fundamental work concerning rotating black holes and their astrophysical consequences"|rowspan=3 style="text-align: center;"||
|style="text-align:center;"||Roger Blandford||||||||||
||Mathematics|style="text-align:center;"||Yakov Eliashberg||"for the development of contact and symplectic topology and groundbreaking discoveries of rigidity and flexibility phenomena"||||||
|rowspan=3|2017|rowspan=3|Polyarthritis|style="text-align:center;"||Shimon Sakaguchi||rowspan=3|"for their discoveries relating to regulatory T cells, which counteract harmful immune reactions in arthritis and other autoimmune diseases."|rowspan=3 style="text-align: center;"||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|Fred Ramsdell||||||||||
|style="text-align:center;"||Alexander Rudensky||||||||||
|rowspan=2|2018|rowspan=2|Geosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Syukuro Manabe|/|rowspan=2|"for fundamental contributions to understanding the role of atmospheric trace gases in Earth’s climate system."|rowspan=2 style="text-align: center;"||
|style="text-align:center;"|—|Susan Solomon||||||||||
|2019|Biosciences|style="text-align:center;"|—|Sallie W. Chisholm||"for the discovery and pioneering studies of the most abundant photosynthesising organism on Earth, Prochlorococcus".|style="text-align: center;"|||||
|rowspan=2|2020|Astronomy|style="text-align:center;"||Eugene Parker||"for pioneering and fundamental studies of the solar wind and magnetic fields from stellar to galactic scales".|rowspan=2 style="text-align: center;"||||
|Mathematics|style="text-align:center;"||Enrico Bombieri|/|"for outstanding and influential contributions in all the major areas of mathematics, particularly number theory, analysis and algebraic geometry".|||||||
|2021|Polyarthritis||Daniel L. Kastner||"for establishing the concept of autoinflammatory diseases".|||||||