Up to 1 million euros for groundbreaking scientific work: our new Future Insight Prize

The Future Insight Prize supports researchers working on four pressing issues facing humanity. Effective immediately, you can nominate scientists in the field of pandemic preparedness.

Over the past decades, humanity has made great progress. Global average life expectancy at birth has climbed from 31 years at the beginning of the 20th century to 72 years today. The proportion of people living in extreme poverty has fallen dramatically – even though the world’s population has grown steadily. On average, we are now living longer than ever before. And, on the whole, we are wealthier than ever before in human history.

This substantial progress has been made possible to a very large degree by science and technology. Yet despite all achievements, we still face substantial threats and challenges.

You probably remember the Ebola outbreak in Western Africa about four years ago. Through concerted action, the international community was able to contain the disease and prevent it from spreading further. But pandemics continue to pose a major threat. The question is not if one will break out, but when.

Another health threat that we must deal with is antimicrobial resistance (AMR). It jeopardizes our ability to treat common infectious diseases and threatens to reverse many of the health gains that we have achieved over the past years and decades. Today, AMR is already responsible for 25,000 deaths in the EU every year, worldwide that number could reach 700,000. Many experts expect a further increase in deaths in the coming years.

Health threats are not the only kind of challenge we face. The most prominent one probably is climate change. It is a scientific fact that the CO2 concentration in our atmosphere is rising at the fastest pace since measurement began – and this is a man-made phenomenon. If we don’t act decisively, we will face very dire ecological, economic, social and even geopolitical consequences.

On top of all this, we must provide enough high-quality food for a global population that according to United Nations estimates, will reach 9.8 billion in 2050 and 11.2 billion by 2100. Even though we have made great progress in tackling hunger, there are still almost 800 million people suffering from chronic undernourishment today, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. So, in the light of a growing world population, we’ll need new technologies to secure adequate nutrition for everyone.

These are tough challenges – but they are solvable. Not through ignorance or through ideological rigor, but through science that paves the way for the new technologies that we need.

I strongly believe that science is a force for good. At Merck, we have been contributing to scientific progress for 350 years. And we want to continue to advance research in the future, to find new solutions to the dangers just described. Therefore, in our anniversary year, we decided to launch the "Future Insight Prize". With this prize, we want to stimulate innovative solutions and drive the development of what we call dream products.

We call them dream products because while they don’t exist yet, when they become reality, they could not only mitigate, but solve these four existential challenges to mankind.

What are these dream products we envision?

For example, a Pandemic Protector that can analyse clinical samples of people infected with an unknown pathogen. This dream product should then be able to produce an agent to cure the infected person or to prevent the infection of others within a clinically relevant timeframe.

We’re imagining a Multi-Drug Resistance Breaker. A series of novel narrow-spectrum antibacterial agents that can cure any bacterial infection without inducing drug resistance.

We envision a CO2-to-Fuel Converter that generates high-energy-density fuel from renewable energy, water and atmospheric carbon dioxide with an overall negative carbon dioxide balance.

And some day we would like to see a Food Generator that converts any non-edible biomass into edible fully-nutritional food within one day without producing any biohazardous waste.

Granted, these dream products sound a bit like science fiction. And they should. With the Future Insight Prize, we want to encourage scientists around the world to make these dream products a reality. This is why from now on, we plan to grant up to 1 million euros every year for the next 35 years to researchers who are striving to make these dream products a reality. The first Future Insight Prize will be awarded next year for achievements in the field of pandemic preparedness.

The final candidates for the Future Insight Prize will be nominated by a jury of internationally renowned scientists. However, you can also nominate projects that in your view deserve to receive this prize via this website.

Seize this opportunity and propose scientific projects that can help us fight pandemics better and should therefore be honored with the Future Insight Prize. We're looking forward to your suggestions!