Investment in young researchers to boost Swedish research

Press release
1 December 2016

The Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation’s investments in young researchers continue with 29 new Wallenberg Academy Fellows. The research challenges that this year’s Academy Fellows are tackling include important issues for the future, such as energy provision and public health.

 “Since the program started in 2012, 150 young researchers have become Wallenberg Academy Fellows. The Foundation is very happy to be able to provide promising research talent the opportunity to freely develop their ideas over a five-year period,” says Peter Wallenberg Jr, Chairman of the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation.

The purpose of these investments is to boost Sweden as a research nation by retaining the greatest talents in the country and by recruiting young international researchers to Swedish universities. Via an integral mentor program, they also have an opportunity to strengthen their scientific leadership and better utilize their research results.

 “More than half of this year’s Academy Fellows have a foreign doctorate. This demonstrates that the program is very attractive outside of Sweden too. We are delighted that almost 40 per cent of the people appointed, in tough academic competition, are women,” says the Foundation’s Executive Director, Göran Sandberg.

The program has been established in partnership with the scholarly academies and Swedish universities.

 “Wallenberg Academy Fellows is a major investment that provides many of Sweden’s most promising young researchers with the chance to build strong lines of research. This program is among the most important to be carried out in current Swedish research and development,” says Göran K. Hansson, Secretary General of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

2016’s Wallenberg Academy Fellows: 
(Where the nominating university is not the researcher’s current university, the nominating university’s name is in parentheses). 

Natural Sciences 

Dr. Oscar Agertz, University of Surrey, UK (Stockholm University)

Dr. Yaowen Wu, Max Planck Institute, Dortmund, Germany (Umeå University) 

Associate Professor Karin Schönning, Uppsala University 

Dr. Georgios Dimitroglou Rizell, University of Cambridge, UK (Uppsala University) 

Dr. Abraham Mendoza, Stockholm University 

Dr. Charles Melnyk, University of Cambridge, UK (Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences) 

Dr. Sarah Greenwood, Stockholm University 

Dr. John Fitzpatrick, Stockholm University 

Dr. Björn Burmann, University of Basel, Switzerland (University of Gothenburg)

Dr. Agnese Bissi, Harvard University, USA (Uppsala University)

Social Sciences 

Associate Professor Jonas Olofsson, Stockholm University 
Dr. Erik Mohlin, Lund University 

Dr. Jutta Bolt, University of Groningen, the Netherlands (Lund University) 

Dr. Giulia Andrighetto, European University Institute, Italy and the Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies of the Italian National Research Council (Mälardalen University) 

Engineering and Technology 

Associate Professor Maria Tenje, Uppsala University 

Associate Professor Anna Martinelli, Chalmers University of Technology 

Associate Professor Emma Lundberg, KTH Royal Institute of Technology

Associate Professor Christoph Langhammer, Chalmers University of Technology 

Dr. Shervin Bagheri, KTH Royal Institute of Technology 

Associate Professor Daniel Aili, Linköping University 

Medicine 

Dr. Laura Baranello, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, USA (Karolinska Institutet)

Dr. Niklas Björkström, Karolinska Institutet

Dr. Vicente Pelechano García, Karolinska Institutet 

Dr. Sidinh Luc, Dana-Farber/Boston Children’s Cancer and Blood Disorders Center, USA (Karolinska Institutet) 

Dr. Sasan Zandi, University of Toronto, Canada (Linköping University) 

Dr. Fredrik Lanner, Karolinska Institutet 

Dr. Claudia Kutter, University of Cambridge, UK (Karolinska Institutet) 

Dr. Olaf Bergmann, Karolinska Institutet 

Humanities 

Dr. Antti Kauppinen, University of Tampere, Finland (University of Gothenburg) 

 

Go to the presentations