2024 Jiří Friml

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FWF Wittgenstein Awards

Jiří Friml

Austria’s most highly endowed research award

With nominees named by the scientific community, winners selected by an international jury of experts, and a €1.9 million endowment that exceeds all other individual funding awards in Austria, the FWF Wittgenstein Award is unique in every respect. With this award, the FWF not only honors exceptional academic careers, but also offers researchers the resources they need to advance their own research work at the highest international level.

Gruppenbild der FWF-START und Wittgenstein-Preisträger — Setting the stage for outstanding research: The researchers accepting their awards at the formal award ceremony © Daniel Novotny/FWF

Target group

The funding program is aimed at outstanding researchers from all disciplines.

Funding goals

The program provides both recognition and support to excellent researchers (up to 60 years of age) who have already produced exceptional work and who occupy a prominent place in the international scientific community.

Funding period and funding amount

60 months
€1.9 million

Jiří Friml 2024

In 2024, the award went out to Czech cell biologist Jiří Friml. Through his groundbreaking research in the field of cell biology, Jiří Friml has made a significant contribution to progress in his field of research and to a better understanding of the mechanisms behind plant growth. His work is of an exceptionally pioneering nature and allows us to look deep into the evolutionary development of the botanic world. In his groundbreaking work, he discovered the universal importance of the hormone auxin in plants. The biochemist, cell biologist, and geneticist is head of the Developmental and Cell Biology of Plants research group at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA). Jiří Friml’s research group specializes in the study of the hormone auxin in plants.