The Gruber Foundation today recognized four scientists who have made significant contributions to the fields of cosmology, genetics, and neuroscience. Recipients of the Gruber International Prize Program will receive a total of $1.5 million for research that inspires and enables fundamental shifts in knowledge and culture.
Recipients of the 2025 awards are Ryan Cooke, a professor at Durham University in the United Kingdom, and Max Pettini, a professor of observational astronomy at the University of Cambridge’s Institute of Astronomy, recipients of the 2025 Gruber Cosmology Prize; Rotem Sorek, a professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel, recipient of the 2025 Gruber Genetics Prize; and Edward F. Chang, of the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), recipient of the 2025 Gruber Neuroscience Prize.
Patricia Gruber and her late husband, Peter Gruber, established an International Prize Program in 2000 to honor and encourage outstanding individuals in the sciences and human rights. In a succession plan to perpetuate this legacy, The Gruber Foundation was established at Yale in 2011.
All three prizes will be presented later this year.
More information about the recipients follows:
The 2025 Gruber Cosmology Prize
Ryan Cooke, a professor at Durham University’s Centre for Extragalactic Astronomy, and Max Pettini, a professor of observational astronomy at the University of Cambridge’s Institute of Astronomy, were selected for bringing the light element abundances and Big Bang Nucleosynthesis into the realm of precision cosmology. Their collaboration determined a key value in the composition of the universe moments after it came into existence and perfected the method that allowed them to make that measurement.
The 2025 Gruber Genetics Prize
Rotem Sorek, a geneticist and molecular biologist at the Weizmann Institute of Science, was selected for his ground-breaking discoveries of scores of anti-viral defense systems in bacteria and their evolutionary connections to our own innate immune system. “Sorek’s discoveries have already had multiple impacts,” said Allan Spradling, professor at the Carnegie Institution/HHMI and chair of the Selection Advisory Board. “His discoveries that bacterial immune defense systems are conserved in the human immune system has reshaped our understanding of human immunity.”
The 2025 Gruber Neuroscience Prize
Edward F. Chang, a neurosurgeon at UCSF, was selected for his groundbreaking research on how the human brain encodes speech. His work has not only revealed how the brain encodes the sounds and movements of spoken language but has also led to the development of the first successful speech neuroprosthesis to restore communication in individuals with paralysis.
For more information, visit The Gruber Foundation’s website, e-mail info@gruber.yale.edu; contact A. Sarah Hreha at 203-432-6231; or write to: The Gruber Foundation, Yale University, Office of International Affairs, PO Box 208320, New Haven, CT 06520.
