The prizes were awarded to Dr Emmanuel Abbé from the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne), Dr Dominic Eggel from the Université de Genève (University of Geneva), Professor Paola Picotti from the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich) and Professor Conny Wunsch from the Université de St-Gall (University of St. Gallen).

This year, the philosopher, economist and political scientist Francis Fukuyama, Professor at the University of Stanford attended the event as the guest of honour and gave a lecture entitled ‘European Identity/ies’.

The prizes have been awarded every year since 1983 to 4 researchers under 40 years old and amount to 25,000 Swiss Francs each. They are awarded in order to recognise the scientific contribution of the awardees and encourage them to continue their research work.

The following speeches took place during the ceremony held at the University of Geneva:

• Francis Fukuyama, ''Nation Building and Identity in Europe'' (Keynote Address)
• Dominic Eggel, ''The Idea of Europe in Classical Weimar: The Case of Goethe, Schiller, Herder and Wieland''
• Emmanuel Abbe, ''Transferring Information in Networks''
• Conny Wunsch, ''Empirical Evaluation and Optimal Design of Unemployment Insurance System''
• Paola Piccoti, ''Selected Reaction Monitoring: A Tool for Quantifying Proteins in Biology and Biomedicine''