Professor Pål Nyrén wins prize
Pål Nyrén, Professor of Biochemistry at KTH, has been awarded the Wilhelm Westrup Prize of MSEK 1.3 by the Royal Physiographical Society of Lund. Pål Nyrén is best known for his development of pyrosequencing, a successful method of reading DNA.
DNA sequencing is currently an invaluable instrument used within many different areas: medicine, agriculture and forensic sciences. Within the agricultural sector the method is used to study both plants and animals. Pål Nyrén’s method, pyrosequencing, has been used to map the DNA of mammoths and Neanderthal man - among many other things.
Pål Nyrén arrived at the concept of pyrosequencing in 1986, but it took ten years for it to be fully developed for practical applications. This method has been made commercially viable first through a company called Biotage in Uppsala and nowadays through the Rande and Qiagen companies.
When the scientific journal Science published its 2006 list of the greatest scientific discoveries of the year, Nyrén’s pyrosequencing method was number two. The specific project that was celebrated was the current mapping of Neanderthal DNA currently underway and directed by Svante Pääbo, one of the leading world researchers within evolutionary biology.
The Westrup Prize is awarded every five years. The winner is selected by the Swedish Royal Physiographical Society of Lund who have established funds and received donations intended for medals and prizes to reward eminent scientific achievements.
Christer Gummeson