Kenyan developmental biologist Azim Surani, a TWAS Fellow since 1990, has been named one of the 2025 Kyoto Prize laureates.

Surani has served as the director of the germline and epigenomics research group of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland since 2013. He is a global leader in epigenetics, a discipline that studies the environment’s influence on the way our genes are turned on and off. His work has significantly advanced our understanding of how sperm and eggs develop.

After earning his PhD from the University of Cambridge in 1975, Surani joined the Babraham Institute in 1979, where he discovered the genomic imprinting, a mechanism that regulates how genes are turned on and off according to their parental origin.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1990, Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences in 2001, awarded a Royal Medal in 2010, and, in 2014, the International Society for Stem Cell Research McEwen Award for Innovation.

The Kyoto Prize, one of Japan’s most prestigious international awards, recognizes individuals who have made significant contributions in the fields of science and technology, as well as the arts and philosophy.

Each laureate receives a diploma, a Kyoto Prize medal, and a monetary prize of 100 million yen per (approximately US$700,000).