The Finnish Society of Sciences and Letters grants science and teaching awards for over €100,000

The Finnish Society of Sciences and Letters has granted scientific and teaching awards to seven meritorious persons, for an amount of over €100,000.

The most distinguished award, Professor E.J. Nyström’s prize (€30,000) is awarded to academy professor Katariina Salmela-Aro (University of Helsinki) for her very successful and significant research on children’s and young people’s learning and well-being.

“Salmela-Aro’s research work has continuously yielded results in current topics, such as the use of artificial intelligence in learning and the effects of the corona pandemic on students’ and young people’s school fatigue and participation”

Katariina Salmela-Aho

Professor Theodor Homén’s prize in physics (€20,000) is awarded to Professor Ronald Österbacka from Åbo Akademi. Österbacka researches electrically conductive polymers and electro-optical properties in organic molecules, and his research is an interdisciplinary combination of experimental physics with polymer chemistry and cell biology.

Ronald Österbacka

FD Mikael Björnberg’s memorial fund scholarship for young researchers in theoretical physics (€10,000) is awarded to Saga Säppi (Technical University of Munich, TUM). Her research area is theoretical particle physics and more specifically how a substance behaves in an extremely hot and/or dense state using so-called perturbation theory. In this area of research, Säppi is at the absolute top internationally.

Saga Säppi

The purpose of the Magnus Ehrnrooth Foundation is to promote and support purely scientific basic research that aims to deepen and increase knowledge in mathematics, astronomy, physics, and chemistry, including medicinal chemistry. At the suggestion of the Finnish Society of Sciences and Letters, the foundation, in addition to grants and scholarships to a sum of approximately €1.9 million, annually awards a prize to an outstanding researcher in one of the sciences.

This year, the Magnus Ehrnrooth chemistry prize of €20,000 goes to Mauri Kostiainen, professor of polymer technology at Aalto University. Kostiainen is a very successful and distinguished researcher and teacher. He has created a career as a researcher in Finland in a completely new research area and managed to train many young researchers.

Mauri Kostiainen

The Finnish Society of Sciences and Letters also awarded three upper secondary school teachers whose students successfully continued their studies in the teacher’s subject at the university level with €5,000 each. The prize winners are Jon Rikberg, geography teacher at Mattliden upper secondary school in Espoo, Hellevi Kupila, mathematics teacher at Oulun normaalikoulun lukio in Oulu and Pirkko Roslöf, Swedish language teacher at Mynämäen lukio in Mynämäki. The prize-winners’ schools also receive €2,000 to develop the subject in question.