2 UNIVERSITY PROFESSORS BAG KING FAISAL PRIZE DEVELOPING COVID-19 VACCINES

KUALA LUMPUR, March 22 (Bernama) – Harvard University and Oxford University professors Dan Barouch and Sarah Gilbert, received the King Faisal Prize for Medicine in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, for their innovative technologies developing Covid-19 vaccines, which saved millions of lives.

Additionally, Northwestern University Professor, Chad Mirkin, and the A*STAR Senior Fellow and NanoBio Lab Director, Professor Jackie Yi-Ru Ying, were awarded the Science Prize for helping define the modern age of nanotechnology, and for their various advancements and applications of nanomaterials.

Barouch; the William Bosworth Castle Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and Gilbert; the Saïd Chair of Vaccinology in the Nuffield Department of Medicine at Oxford University, employed a novel technology in developing Covid-19 viral vectors vaccines which are the Johnson & Johnson vaccine and the Oxford–AstraZeneca vaccine, respectively.

Instead of the traditional vaccines’ methods which use a weakened or killed form of the original infection and require a long time to develop in the human body, the two professors genetically modified a harmless version of a different virus to carry genetic material to body cells and deliver protection.

“This vaccine has been rolled out across the world by the pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson, and over 200 million people have received this vaccine, particularly in the developing world,” said Barouch in a statement.

Meanwhile, Gilbert said: “This award is in recognition of my work to co-create a vaccine for COVID-19. A low-cost, accessible, efficacious vaccine that has now been used in more than 180 countries and is estimated to have saved more than six million lives by the start of 2022.”

Along with Medicine and Science, the King Faisal Prize recognised outstanding thinkers and scholars in Arabic Language & Literature and Islamic Studies this year and honoured exemplary leaders who have contributed to serve Islam, Muslims and humanity.

Professor Abdelfattah Kilito, from Morocco, received the “Arabic Language & Literature” prize focusing on “Classical Arabic Narrative and Modern Theories”, while Professor Robert Hillenbrand (United Kingdom), Honorary Professorial Fellow in the department of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Edinburgh, was awarded the “Islamic Studies” prize in “Islamic Architecture”. 

As for the “Service to Islam” Prize, Professor Choi Young Kil-Hamed (South Korea) and Shaikh Nasser Abdullah Al Zaabi (the United Arab of Emirates) were this year’s laureates.

Each prize laureate is endowed with US$200,000; a 24-carat gold medal weighing 200 grammes, and a Certificate inscribed with the Laureate’s name and a summary of their work which qualified them for the prize. (US$1=RM4.46)

-- BERNAMA