Academia Europaea Newsletter, November 2025
Published 3rd November 2025
Our monthly Newsletter keeps you up-to-date with what’s happening at Academia Europaea.
BUILDING BRIDGES CONFERENCE SPECIAL
Highlights of Building Bridges 2025
Our Barcelona Hub warmly welcomed more than 250 AE Members to Building Bridges 2025, Academia Europaea’s Annual Conference, held at the Barcelona Biomedical Research Park (PRBB) from 15th-17th October.
Participants enjoyed an engaging programme. Highlights included a Master Class with internationally acclaimed medieval musician Jordi Savall, and a lecture by newly awarded Nobel laureate Philippe Aghion MAE. The conference also featured a special welcome event for new AE Members.
We proudly celebrated our 2025 prize winners:
- László Lovász MAE - Erasmus Medal
- Markus Ralser MAE - Sydney Brenner Prize
- Jens Stougaard MAE - Adam Kondorosi Prize for Advanced Research
The conference also offered time to connect and explore, with highlights including a geological excursion to Montserrat Mountain and a visit to the renowned Torres winery.
Science inspired by life: An interview with Dennis Lo
Ahead of our conference, we spoke with keynote speaker Professor Dennis Lo MAE about his groundbreaking work on cell-free foetal DNA. Professor Lo reflects on the discovery of cell-free foetal DNA, the global impact of non-invasive prenatal testing, and how everyday inspiration drives advances in diagnostic medicine. Read our interview.
Exploring the invisible universe: An interview with Licia Verde MAE
Cosmologist Licia Verde MAE took to the stage in Barcelona to explore the mysteries of our universe. As part of our Building Bridges 2025 Spotlight Series, she discusses dark matter, dark energy, and why discovery is as much about the journey as the destination. Read our interview.
More information about Building Bridges
- Watch the recorded sessions.
- Visit our photo gallery to check out some of our Conference highlights. Participants will have received a code to access the gallery.
- We welcome your thoughts and suggestions on the Conference. Please share your feedback by emailing aebarcelona@fundaciorecerca.cat
- Building Bridges 2026, the 37th Annual Conference of Academia Europaea, will take place at the Bálna (Whale) Evening Centre in Budapest from 12th - 16th October 2026. More.
AWARDS AND ACHIEVEMENTS
Philippe Aghion MAE awarded the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in memory of Alfred Nobel 2025
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has awarded the 2025 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in memory of Alfred Nobel to Philippe Aghion MAE, jointly with Joel Mokyr and Peter Howitt, “for having explained innovation-driven economic growth". Find out more.
Hugh Jenkyns MAE has been awarded the Lyell Medal from the Geological Society of London for 2025. Find out more.
- Steve Liddle MAE has been awarded the Terrae Rarae Award from the Tage der Seltenen Erden. Find out more.
- Stefania Milan MAE has been elected to the KNAW, the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. She has also been nominated by the Belgian Francqui Foundation as a Francqui Chair 2025/26 at the School of Social Sciences Hasselt University.
- Sanjit K. Mitra MAE has been recognised with several prestigious honours, including election as a Corresponding Member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities, receipt of the Distinguished Career Award in Engineering from the Washington Academy of Sciences, and election as a Foreign Corresponding Member of the Academy of Lisbon, Portugal.
- Marcel Swart MAE and colleagues from the Universities of Minnesota, Carnegie Mellon, and Girona have received the 2025 Dalton Horizon Prize from the Royal Society of Chemistry for their discovery and characterisation of reactive ligands for high-valent iron–oxo oxidants. Find out more.
- Yuming Guo MAE, John Rasko MAE, Federico Rosei MAE and Peng Shi MAE have been elected to the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE). Find out more. Professor Rosei has also been elected 2026 Fellow of The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS).
If you have won an award or prize, or know a Member of Academia Europaea who has, we'd love to hear about it. Contact office@ae-info.org. Check out our Prizes, Awards and Medals page.
EVENTS
Disputatio 2025: The disconnection between science and society: A European crisis of trust?
27th November, Barcelona
Since its launch in 2013, our Barcelona Hub, in collaboration with the Barcelona City Council, has organised the Disputatio of Barcelona - an annual academic debate that brings together two distinguished scholars (the disputantes) to exchange contrasting perspectives on a topic of broad societal relevance. This year’s Disputatio will examine the growing disconnection between science and society, asking whether Europe is facing a crisis of trust in scientific knowledge.
Disputants are Massimiano Bucchi MAE, Professor of Sociology of Science, University of Trento, Italy and Gloria Origgi, Senior Researcher in Philosophy and Social Epistemology, Institut Jean Nicod (CNRS), Paris, France. Patricia Fernández de Lis, Editor-in-chief of Materia (El País science section), based in Madrid, will moderate the session.
CALLS
Scientific Grand Prize 2026: Call for nominations
The Institut de France’s Lefoulon-Delalande Foundation invites nominations for its 2026 Scientific Grand Prize. This prestigious award, worth €600,000 (€120,000 for the award winner and €480,000 for their laboratory or institute), recognises a scientist - based in France or abroad - who has made important contributions to cardiovascular physiology, biology, or medicine.
Deadline for nominations: 19th January 2026. Find out more.
LATEST NEWS FROM ACADEMIA EUROPAEA
2025/26 nominations cycle for new Members now open
The nomination period for AE membership in 2025/26 has opened. Academia Europaea Ordinary Members are encouraged to nominate distinguished scientists and scholars with proven international recognition. Please read carefully the updated nomination guidelines before submitting a nomination.
Reminder: Pay your 2025 membership contributions
Our Treasurer, Steve Evans MAE, kindly reminds Members who have not yet paid their 2025 membership contributions to do so at their earliest convenience. Guidance on how to pay online is available on our website. Members may also choose to make a life payment, which means you will no longer be asked for annual contributions.
Important changes to the Physics and Engineering Sciences Section
Academia Europaea’s Physics and Engineering Sciences Section has been divided into two distinct Sections: Physics and Engineering. All Members of the original Section have been notified of this change by email. Members are invited to choose the Section that best aligns with their expertise. If you would like to be transferred to the new Engineering Section, please contact Dana Kaiser at dkaiser@iicm.edu. If you wish to remain in the Physics Section, no action is needed.
Latest Hub news
Our Cardiff Hub has published its Annual Report for 2025, its final report before closing at the end of the year. We take stock of the Hub’s ten years, to celebrate all it has achieved and to look forward to Cardiff University’s continuing role in the European Scientific Advice Mechanism. The AE Cardiff website will be archived and made accessible in perpetuity. This will be performed by the British Library, as part of its responsibilities for national legal deposit, governed by UK law.
Latest from the European Review
The latest issue of European Review is now live on Cambridge Core. It includes a special selection of articles developed from the symposium Writing transcultural literary history in a globalised world, held in Uppsala, Sweden, in October 2023. Find out more.
IN MEMORIAM
Academia Europaea mourns the loss of:
Humanities and Arts
Margaret Boden (1936 - 2025) Philosophy, Theology and Religious Studies
Social and Related Sciences
Géry van Outryve d'Ydewalle (1946 - 2025) The Human Mind and its
Complexity
Katariina Salmela-Aro (1961-2025) The Human Mind and its Complexity
Øyvind Østerud (1944 - 2025) Human Mobility, Governance, Environment and Space
Claus Offe (1940 - 2025) Social Change and Social Thought
Exact Sciences
Sergio Doplicher (1940 - 2025) Mathematics
Gérard Laumon (1952 - 2025) Mathematics
Mario Primicerio (1940 - 2025) Mathematics
Idun Reiten (1942 - 2025) Mathematics
Jean-Raymond Abrial (1938 - 2025) Informatics
Jan Villem Klop (1945 - 2025) Informatics
Rodney Burstall (1934 - 2025) Informatics
Herwig Schopper (1924 - 2025) Physics
Peter Hirsch (1925 - 2025) Physics
Francis Graham-Smith (1923 - 2025) Earth and Cosmic Sciences
Life Sciences
Étienne-Émile Baulieu (1926 - 2025) Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
David Baltimore (1938 - 2025) Cell and Developmental Biology
Sir John Gurdon (1933 - 2025) Cell and Developmental Biology
Henk van der Molen (1936 -2025) Physiology and Neuroscience
If you are aware of any Members of Academia Europaea who have passed away, kindly inform us at office@ae-info.org.
Academia Europaea
www.ae-info.org
HQ Office
LMU Munich
Room 334, Theresienstr. 41, 80333 Munich
F.Brandthaus@acadeuro.org +49 89 2180 4294
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Written and published by the Academia Europaea Cardiff Hub