Astrophysics professor with a long career at NASA, Chrysa Kouveliotouand the Professor of Molecular Systems Biology and President of the Technology and Research Foundation, Nektarios Tavernarakisare honored this year with the Excellence of the Bodosaki Foundation for their pioneering life’s work.

The two Bodosaki Excellences will be awarded by the President of the Republic, Katerina Sakellaropoulou, in a ceremony that will take place on Tuesday, June 25 at Zappeion Megaro.

The “space” scientist Chrysa Kouveliotou

Specifically, the Bodosaki Excellence Award 2024 in the field of Positive Sciences is awarded to Chryssa Kouveliotou, Professor of Astrophysics in the Department of Physics of the Columbian College of Arts and Sciences at George Washington University, who with more than 25 years of service at NASA has contributed substantially to the deeper understanding of transient celestial phenomena, through the study of phenomena related to black holes, neutron stars, and gamma-ray bursts.

With rich research activity, it has been included in his list Time Magazine with 25 Most Influential People in Spaceas well as in the list of the 250 most cited researchers worldwide in Space science with 493 publications in scientific journals after crisis.

He is a member of the US National Academy of Science and the US Academy of Arts and Sciences, a member of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences and a corresponding member of the Athens Academy.

In its long course it has received numerous top honorssuch as the Descartes (2002), Rossi (2003) and D. Heineman (2012) prizes, the Shaw Prize in Astrophysics (2021), while the Greek Government honored her with the Brigadier’s Cross of the Order of Honor for excellence in Science (2015).

The “wizard of bioscience” Nektarios Tavernarakis

The 2024 Bodosaki Award in the field of Biomedical Sciences is awarded to Nektarios Tavernarakis, Professor of Molecular Systems Biology at the Medical School of the University of Crete, President of the Technology and Research Foundation, and President of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT).

Nektarios Tavernarakis is located at cutting edge of modern biomedical research in the fields of aging, cell death and neurodegeneration.

Among his important scientific discoveries are specific classes of enzymes involved in necrotic cell death, the revelation of the role of key regulators of protein synthesis in aging and the decisive contribution to the discovery of mitochondrial quality control mechanisms, related to the regulation of cellular energy homeostasis and aging.

Among others, he is a member of the American Agency for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO), the German National Academy of Sciences, the European Academy of Sciences, and a corresponding member of the Academy of Athens.

In his long scientific career, he has received the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) Young Researcher Award, the Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, the Helmholtz International Fellow Award, the Galien Scientific Research Award, the Aretaio Award for Medical Biology of Sciences of the Academy of Athens, as well as the Scientific Award of the Bodosaki Foundation in 2005 in the field of Life Sciences.

The institution of Aristios Bodosakis

The Bodosakis Excellence Award was launched in 2002 and returns 13 years after the last awards, with a new Excellence committee, made up of eight foreign scientists of international renown. The committee is co-chaired by Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Cambridge, Daan Frenkel, and Professor of Molecular Biology at the Erasmus University Medical Center in the Netherlands, Frank Grosveld.

Every two years, two Excellences will be awarded in two scientific fields, accompanied by a cash prize of 100,000 euros each. “The Bodosaki Award aims to recognize and honor the entire scientific career and contribution of Greek women and men scientists who played a catalytic role in the development of their science, with a conscious commitment and passion for scientific research, the promotion and development of knowledge “, points out the president of the Board of Directors of the Bodosakis Foundation, Athina Desypri.

To date, seven other personalities of the international scientific community have been awarded the Bodosaki Award for their extremely important work, namely professors Georgios Chroussos (2011), Charalambos Moutsopoulos (2011), Evangelos Moudrianakis (2009), Dimitris Christodoulou (2006), Athanasios Fokas (2006), Kyriakos Nikolaou (2004) and Ioannis Iliopoulos (2002).