Jørgen Kjems from CellPAT receives this year’s Novo Nordisk Prize
The head of a DNRF center, Jørgen Kjems, will be this year’s recipient of the Novo Nordisk Prize for his innovative research on cellular communication.
Since November 2017, Jørgen Kjems has headed the DNRF’s Center for Cellular Signal Patterns (CellPAT) at Aarhus University. For years, his name has been synonymous with innovative research into RNA and cellular communication.
On January 31, it was announced that Kjems will receive the Novo Nordisk Prize this year. The prize is given to “recognize unique medical research or other research contributions that benefit medical science.”
“I am extremely honored and very surprised to receive the prize. I am grateful for the recognition of the importance of interdisciplinarity and wide-ranging vision that enable researchers to carry out both basic research and applied research within medicine. I consider this prize as recognizing not just my research but also that of my colleagues,” said Kjems to the Novo Nordisk Foundation.
The Novo Nordisk Foundation awards the prize, which is accompanied by a disbursement of DKK 3 million, of which DKK 2.5 million is available for research purposes within the prize recipient’s research field and DKK 500,000 is a personal award.
Since 2003, he has been professor of molecular biology and nanoscience at Aarhus University, where he is currently the head of the iNANO center and the DNRF-funded Center of Excellence CellPAT, which opened its doors on November 1 last year.