It takes some getting used to: this Wednesday, research financier NWO will be awarding only two Spinoza Prizes of 1.5 million euros for the first time. Until now, the most important Dutch science prize has gone to four ‘researchers who, by international standards, belong to the very best scientists worldwide’, but NWO has decided to halve this number, so that an equal number of Spinoza and Stevin prizes are now awarded. The latter prize, also 1.5 million euros, goes every year to two researchers who have ‘achieved a special success in the field of knowledge utilization for society’.
This intervention is in line with NWO’s aim to promote both scientific breakthroughs and social impact equally, a spokesperson said. The resources released by this change will be used by NWO for its Talent Program (Veni, Vidi, Vici), so that a previously imposed reduction can be absorbed. “We think it is important to continue to encourage young talent,” said the spokesperson.
Joyeta Gupta ‘The impact of global warming mainly affects poor people’ Photo Studio Oostrum
Joyeeta Gupta (1964) is a professor at the University of Amsterdam. She studies distribution issues arising from climate change. Central to her research is understanding the connection between the climate crisis, possible solutions and justice. To this end, it brings together various scientific disciplines, from international law and economics to political science and environmental studies.
What will you do with the money?
“My dot on the horizon is a global constitution. In any case, it states what the rights and obligations of countries are with regard to climate, water, biodiversity and raw materials. Now there is a lot of injustice. The rich have a dominant share in global warming, but the impact mainly affects poor people.
“There are many interesting issues. Developing countries want to extract their fossil fuels in order to grow economically. Are we in the West going to say that they are not allowed to do that? By the way, there are also groups within those countries that demand clean air and sufficient nature. In my research I want to look even more explicitly at: what is fair, and what is unacceptable?”
When did you find out you were good at your job?
“In 1998 I was invited by the IPCC, the climate panel of the United Nations, to participate in a subsequent report. Then you know that you are valued as a scientist. After that, I served on various global committees dealing with the state of the environment and its impact on human well-being. In 2016, when I was asked to co-chair the latest report of the Global Environment Outlook , I knew I had reached the global level. This report charts trends in the environment and the sustainable development goals. In 2019 I was asked to become co-chair of the Earth Commission, which charts a safe and just route for humans to live on the earth.”
What do you dislike most in your work?
“I work in a field where you get a lot of criticism. Scientists often say that we are too normative. Social scientists think we are too global. At the IPCC I worked on the chapter on international cooperation, and there we fought a lot about what we could and couldn’t cover. Can you say how many climate lawsuits are pending, or what the relationship is between gender emancipation and climate change?”
“And a bit lighter: at the end of the day I close my laptop and I don’t want to think about climate for a while, but when I turn on the TV in the evening it’s about climate again.”
Marcel aan de Brugh
Toby Kirs ‘The subsoil is one of the last frontiers of the unknown’ Photo Studio Oostrum
Toby Kiers (1976) is a professor at VU University Amsterdam and conducts research into the nutrient trade between plants and underground fungi. Kiers is committed to preserving subsurface biodiversity. Her research offers opportunities for nature conservation and regenerative agriculture.
What will you do with the money?
“I want to increase our possibilities to make the invisible visible. The subsurface is one of the last true frontiers of the unknown. We have a lot of exciting hypotheses we want to test about how fungi control the movements of carbon and other nutrients in their network. With the prize money, we can map these processes even better together with a transdisciplinary team of biophysicists, ecologists, engineers and evolutionary biologists. For example, using the new robot that I am developing with Thomas Shimizu and Loreto Oyarte Galvez from the research institute Amolf. This allows us to film the nutrient flows in complex fungal networks in high resolution.”
When did you find out you were good at your job?
“My superpower is to develop new thoughts about the seemingly mundane things around us. I learned this skill during my PhD, when my supervisor taught me that science is most exciting when you can borrow ideas and tools from other disciplines and use them to bring new perspectives to old problems. The fact that you can use creativity and playfulness with that appeals to me enormously. My supervisor was a great mentor because he always let me explore big ideas, even when I was a young scientist.”
What do you dislike most in your work?
“Answering emails. I’d much rather be on a mold sampling expedition than spend time checking my mailbox. The best thing about my job is working with my group – they are the most motivated, smart and creative scientists I’ve ever met. Everyone brings in their own perspectives and crazy ideas, and we never say no to testing such a crazy idea…”
Gemma Venhuizen
Corin Prince ‘In science we pay insufficient attention to ‘typically Dutch’ subjects’ Photo Studio Oostrum
Corien Prins (1961) is a professor at Tilburg University and since 2017 chair of the Scientific Council for Government Policy (WRR). Prins conducts research into the legal implications of new technology at the intersection of science and policy.
What are you going to do with the money?
“It is a lot of money, the award really came as a surprise to me, so I can now say something very general about it at the most. I am now thinking about improving the interaction between young researchers and the policy world in The Hague. This is about competences, learning to understand the policy world and learning to speak another language. But also resilience to political pressure, to prevent you from being sucked into the political dynamics when transferring knowledge. The Outbreak Management Team is a good illustration of the vulnerable position in which scientists can find themselves. We can be more effective at that. While it is good for the policy world to learn that science does not always just present ‘the facts’, but is often also normative – which is not yet the same as ‘politics’.”
When did you find out you were good at your job?
“I started with Slavic languages, purely because I was fascinated by the work of Karel van het Reve. Wonderful, about Russian literature. I was eighteen and yes, then you don’t think about what you can do with it. That is why I later took an elective course in law and I thought that was fantastic from day one. I could put my creativity into it. Why is this arranged like this? What do we want as a society with this? Again the normative aspect, that interests me.”
What do you dislike most in your work?
“I have to think about that for a while. What I think is less, in any case, is that we in science pay insufficient attention to ‘typically Dutch’ subjects. We are very busy with internationalization and by that I don’t mean the students but the research. Suppose I had had a purely Dutch profile and had not published internationally, where would I have been now? While there are plenty of Dutch issues that are relevant to science, take the discussion about nitrogen policy. That perspective is important, after all, the WRR advises the Dutch government on Dutch policy. We are also lagging too far behind internationalization in terms of financing and appreciation and do not recognize enough that there are Dutch challenges to which science can and must contribute.”
Sjoerd de Jong
Brad Nauta ‘It will be something with wireless communication, very small and very economical’ Photo Studio Oostrum
Bram Nauta (1964) is a professor at the University of Twente and an expert in designing circuits on chips. His innovations have had a direct impact on commonly used electronics. Smartphones became more compact and microelectronics became more energy efficient thanks to innovations such as the ‘Nauta circuit’. His work was also the basis of techniques such as 5G, WiFi and Bluetooth.
What will you do with the money?
“I am going to try wild things. Normally, a plan has to be written for everything, which should actually already state what will come out of it to get it financed. But it’s fun to try crazy things and see what works and what doesn’t work. The main things we’ve made came about this way, like the noise canceling circuit. Nobody believed in that, I couldn’t get it patented. Now it is used in every mobile phone.
“What exactly I want to make is a bit vague, otherwise others will do it too, but it will be something on a chip, something with wireless communication, very small and very economical. An entire transmitter or receiver in a small sphere, for example, further in the direction of miniaturization. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could get rid of batteries, that a circuit is so economical that it only needs a small solar cell. If nothing comes out, that’s fine too, we’ve learned something. The most important thing this prize offers is freedom to research what I want.”
When did you find out you were good at your job?
“That realization came about five years after designing the nauta circuit, the circuit that bears my name and on which I obtained my PhD. When I had just come up with it, I went to Philips and asked if they wanted to patent it, but they weren’t that interested. A few years later I ran into people from Ericsson and Nokia at conferences. I introduced myself, to which they replied that they knew me of course. All the major telephone companies used my circuit at the time. Then came the realization that I had made something special.”
What do you dislike most in your work?
“To administrative misery. We spend so much time on nonsense that I don’t see the point of.”
Laura Wismans