Awards
Each year, The Faculty of Science and Technology at University of Gothenburg recognizes four achievements. These are awarded with one of four prizes – the Research Prize, the Thesis Prize, the Educational Prize and the Synergy Prize.
Research Award
The Research Award is given for developing a research line that significantly contributes to novelty of the research at the Faculty of Science and Technology. The award holder will receive a diploma and a prize of 250.000 SEK for research.
Research Award 2025: Anne Bjorkman
Department of Biological & Environmental Sciences
Motivation for the award:
Anne Bjorkman’s scientific contributions focus on understanding how human actions are reshaping Earth’s biodiversity and the functioning of ecosystems. She combines large-scale data syntheses with experimental approaches to reveal both the direction of global change and the processes that drive it. Together, these efforts show how anthropogenic climate change and other human pressures are rapidly altering the composition, structure, and functioning of ecosystems across the planet.
On mountaintops across Europe, climate warming has led to a rapid influx of warm-adapted species, reshaping high-alpine biodiversity. In the oceans as well as in the tundra, the number of species in local communities has not changed on average, but turnover – i.e., the gain or loss of species from a community – accelerates under climate warming.
Such compositional change can have knock-on consequences for the rest of the ecosystem; for example, the immigration of taller plant species leads to increases in community height, which in turn alters soil temperatures and carbon cycling in the tundra. In contrast, body size has declined rapidly in marine fish communities due to targeted fishing of large individuals and species, fundamentally restructuring food webs and altering resources available to humans.
Together, these discoveries highlight the pervasiveness of human-driven change and provide a foundation for predicting future shifts in biodiversity and the services that ecosystems provide to people.
Doctoral Thesis Award
This award is given for successful and novel research that has been presented in a well written thesis. The award holder will receive a diploma and a prize.
Doctoral Thesis Award 2025: Jon Lundstrøm
Department of Chemistry and Molecular Biology
Motivation for the award:
The 2025 award is given to Jon Lundstrøm for his PhD thesis “Glycans at the Core: Computational-Experimental Investigations of Complex Carbohydrates”. The thesis dives into the structure and function of glycoconjugates, the “dark matter” of cell biology. Glycoconjugates are molecules consisting of a carbohydrate moiety linked to proteins or lipids. They display extraordinary complexity, vastly exceeding that of nucleic acids and proteins. Analytical methods are currently insufficient to fully explore the structural space of glycoconjugates. Moreover, their functions still mostly remain hidden. The enormous diversity of glycoconjugates is an unsolved enigma: why do organisms need such a tremendous number of different molecules – and indeed, do they really? Glycoconjugates have been shown to have a function in immunity (e.g. blood groups), defense against pathogens, and cell-cell adhesion, but many of their roles may well be uncovered.
In his thesis, Jon Lundstrøm combines computational and artificial-intelligence approaches for structural classification of glycans with experimental cell and molecular biology. His work comprises development of glycan visualization software and a deep learning-based method for protein-glycan binding prediction. It also presents advances in cell biology based on experimental methods from molecular biology to analytical chemistry. It deserves mentioning that Jon Lundstrøm has shown an exceptional productivity during his PhD period. Beside the high-quality papers that are included in his thesis, he has published five peer-reviewed scientific articles as first author – an unusual feat.
His PhD thesis is written in a lucid style, with clear explanations of basic concepts. It shows the connections to many more complex issues, and reflects the versatility of his PhD work. It was presented in a highly pedagogical way with professional-level illustrations during his thesis defense, which was highly appreciated by the audience and thesis committee.
Jon Lundstrøm is a worthy recipient of the PhD thesis award.
The Pedagogical Award
The Faculty of Science’s Pedagogical Award is awarded annually to focus attention on good efforts within education. The award consists of a SEK 100.000 operational contribution.
After 2012 The Pedagogical Award transformed from being an Award for the entire university to be an Award at each Faculty.
Pedagogical Award 2025 in Science: Dag Hanstorp
Department of Physics
Motivation for the award:
Dag Hanstorp has, over many years, initiated and developed a wide range of courses at all levels within the department’s undergraduate education. With a degree in teaching as his foundation, he combines his own curiosity for research and new teaching methods with the need for further education for teachers in Swedish schools, the development of physics courses at the University of Gothenburg, and educational collaborations with international universities across several continents. Examples include professional development for preschool teachers, fostering elementary pupils’ curiosity for science and technology, advanced physics courses for upper secondary students, study visits to CERN for undergraduate students, and teacher exchanges with universities in both Mexico and India. Dag is highly appreciated as a lecturer and consistently receives excellent evaluations from his students. He is an exemplary colleague, and his extensive network and numerous trusted positions testify to his outstanding professional ability. With contagious enthusiasm, he sparks curiosity in everyone he meets—whether it is children, preschool staff, or professors.
The Synergy Award
The Synergy Award recognises positive efforts within the Faculty of Science’s community outreach. The award is in the form of a SEK 250,000 grant to the recipient’s department for appreciated and successful community outreach efforts. The Faculty’s 2021 award will be presented on 2 December.
Synergy Award 2025: Johan Magnusson
Department of Applied IT,
Motivation for the award:
Professor Johan Magnusson receives the Faculty of Science and Technology’s Synergy Award in his role as the co-founder and leader of the Digital Government Research Consortium (DGRC). Since 2018, the DGRC has engaged with external stakeholders to, as they express it “save the welfare state” through excellent research. Core to all engagements is the direct connection with external stakeholders, through commissioned research, executive education and executive doctoral education.
Magnusson and the other faculty members of DGRC have a substantial impact in society, both through their engagement in their projects as well as through over 200 annual keynotes, podcasts, numerous seminars and op-eds. Johan Magnusson has since 2023 been acknowledged as one of Tech Sverige’s “Tech 50”, i.e., the most influential people in technology in Sweden, as well as one of the five most influential people in the digital transformation of the public sector according to Dagens Samhälle.
This strong recognition, along with the constant engagement in public debate has positioned the faculty and department as one of the world’s leading research environments concerning digital government.