FOR RELEASE APRIL 26, 2022 AT 12:00P.M. - Long Do Hoang

Prof. Dr. Markus, 78-year-old emeritus professor of physics at TU Dortmund University, has endowed the prize of €10,000 to promote ludic science - i.e. science out of playfulness - in chemistry and physics. This involves discoveries that have resulted from research conducted not with a specific application in mind, but simply out of curiosity. GDCh has taken over the international call for nominations.

Prof. Dr. Markus is the donor of the award. He grew up as a child of German parents in Chile, where he studied mathematics, biology, chemistry and physics at the Universidad de Chile in Santiago. In 1965, he continued his studies of mathematics and physics in Heidelberg, where he also received his doctorate in 1973. Prof. Markus did research at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysics in Frankfurt am Main in 1974 before he moved to the Max Planck Institute for Nutritional Physiology (now MPI for Molecular Physiology ) in Dortmund in 1975 as a research associate in the department of biochemist and biophysicist Benno Hess. In 1988, he habilitated at the University of Dortmund, where he worked first as a Privatdozent and from 1997 as an associate professor. Prof. Markus has led his own research group at the MPI of Molecular Physiology since 1993.

With the Mario Markus Prize for Ludic Science, the GDCh wants to recognise a scientific work in the field of natural science that is "playful". The term "playful" is used here to designate discoveries that arose from research that was undertaken not with any specific application in mind, but simply out of curiosity about the natural world.

Nominations are open until May 30, 2022!

More information here.