Pontifical Academy of Sciences - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Pontifical Academy of Sciences (Latin Pontificia Academia Scientiarum) is a scientific academy of the Vatican

Holy See

The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...

, founded in 1936 by Pope Pius XI

Pope Pius XI

Pope Pius XI , born Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti, was Pope from 6 February 1922, and sovereign of Vatican City from its creation as an independent state on 11 February 1929 until his death on 10 February 1939...

. It is placed under the protection of the reigning Supreme Pontiff. Its aim is to promote the progress of the mathematical, physical and natural sciences and the study of related epistemological problems. The Academy has its origins in the Accademia Pontificia dei Nuovi Lincei ("Pontifical Academy of the New Lynxes"), founded in 1847 intended as a more closely supervised successor to the Accademia dei Lincei

Accademia dei Lincei

The Accademia dei Lincei, , is an Italian science academy, located at the Palazzo Corsini on the Via della Lungara in Rome, Italy....

("Academy of Lynxes") established in Rome in 1603, by the learned Roman Prince, Federico Cesi

Federico Cesi

Federico Angelo Cesi was an Italian scientist, naturalist, and founder of the Accademia dei Lincei. On his father's death in 1630, he became briefly lord of Acquasparta.- Biography :...

(1585–1630) who was a young botanist and naturalist, and which claimed Galileo Galilei

Galileo Galilei

Galileo Galilei , was an Italian physicist, mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher who played a major role in the Scientific Revolution. His achievements include improvements to the telescope and consequent astronomical observations and support for Copernicanism...

as its president.The Accademia dei Lincei survives as a wholly separate institution.

The Academy is headquartered in the Casina Pio IV

Casina Pio IV

The Casina Pio IV is a patrician villa in Vatican City which is now home to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas. The predecessor of the present complex structure was begun in the spring of 1558 by Pope Paul...

in the heart of the Vatican Gardens.
The academy holds a membership roster of the most respected names in 20th century science, including such Nobel laureates as Ernest Rutherford

Ernest Rutherford

Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson OM, FRS was a New Zealand-born British chemist and physicist who became known as the father of nuclear physics...

, Max Planck

Max Planck

Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck, ForMemRS, was a German physicist who actualized the quantum physics, initiating a revolution in natural science and philosophy. He is regarded as the founder of the quantum theory, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918.-Life and career:Planck came...

, Niels Bohr

Niels Bohr

Niels Henrik David Bohr was a Danish physicist who made foundational contributions to understanding atomic structure and quantum mechanics, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922. Bohr mentored and collaborated with many of the top physicists of the century at his institute in...

, Otto Hahn

Otto Hahn

Otto Hahn FRS was a German chemist and Nobel laureate, a pioneer in the fields of radioactivity and radiochemistry. He is regarded as "the father of nuclear chemistry". Hahn was a courageous opposer of Jewish persecution by the Nazis and after World War II he became a passionate campaigner...

and Charles Hard Townes

Charles Hard Townes

Charles Hard Townes is an American Nobel Prize-winning physicist and educator. Townes is known for his work on the theory and application of the maser, on which he got the fundamental patent, and other work in quantum electronics connected with both maser and laser devices. He shared the Nobel...

History

Cesi wanted his Academicians to create a method of research based upon observation, experiment, and the inductive method. He thus called this Academy "dei Lincei" because the scientists which adhered to it had to have eyes as sharp as lynx

Lynx

A lynx is any of the four Lynx genus species of medium-sized wildcats. The name "lynx" originated in Middle English via Latin from Greek word "λύγξ", derived from the Indo-European root "*leuk-", meaning "light, brightness", in reference to the luminescence of its reflective eyes...

es in order to penetrate the secrets of nature, observing it at both microscopic and macroscopic levels. The leader of the first academy was the famous scientist Galileo Galilei. It was dissolved after the death of its founder and re-created by Pope Pius IX

Pope Pius IX

Blessed Pope Pius IX , born Giovanni Maria Mastai-Ferretti, was the longest-reigning elected Pope in the history of the Catholic Church, serving from 16 June 1846 until his death, a period of nearly 32 years. During his pontificate, he convened the First Vatican Council in 1869, which decreed papal...

in 1847 and given the name Accademia Pontificia dei Nuovi Lincei ("Pontifical Academy of the New Lynxes"), and was re-founded in 1936 by Pope Pius XI

Pope Pius XI

and given its current name. Pope Paul VI

Pope Paul VI

Paul VI , born Giovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini , reigned as Pope of the Catholic Church from 21 June 1963 until his death on 6 August 1978. Succeeding Pope John XXIII, who had convened the Second Vatican Council, he decided to continue it...

in 1976 and Pope John Paul II

Pope John Paul II

Blessed Pope John Paul II , born Karol Józef Wojtyła , reigned as Pope of the Catholic Church and Sovereign of Vatican City from 16 October 1978 until his death on 2 April 2005, at of age. His was the second-longest documented pontificate, which lasted ; only Pope Pius IX ...

in 1986 subsequently updated its statutes.

Since 1936, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences has been concerned both with investigating specific scientific subjects belonging to individual disciplines and with the promotion of interdisciplinary co-operation. It has progressively increased the number of its Academicians and the international character of its membership. The Academy is an independent body within the Holy See and enjoys freedom of research. From the statutes of 1976:

Activities

Since the Academy and its membership is not influenced by factors of a national, political, or religious character it represents a valuable source of objective scientific information which is made available to the Holy See and to the international scientific community. Today the work of the Academy covers six main areas:

fundamental science
the science and technology of global questions and issues
science in favor of the problems of the Third World
the ethics and politics of science
bioethics
epistemology

The disciplines involved are sub-divided into nine fields: the disciplines of physics and related disciplines; astronomy; chemistry; the earth and environmental sciences; the life sciences (botany, agronomy, zoology, genetics, molecular biology, biochemistry, the neurosciences, surgery); mathematics; the applied sciences; and the philosophy and history of sciences.

Goals and Hopes of the Academy

The goals and hopes of the Academy were expressed by Pope Pius XI

Pope Pius XI

in the Motu Proprio which brought about its re-foundation in 1936:

"Amongst the many consolations with which divine Goodness has wished to make happy the years of our Pontificate, I am happy to place that of our having being able to see not a few of those who dedicate themselves to the studies of the sciences mature their attitude and their intellectual approach towards religion. Science, when it is real cognition, is never in contrast with the truth of the Christian faith. Indeed, as is well known to those who study the history of science, it must be recognized on the one hand that the Roman Pontiffs and the Catholic Church have always fostered the research of the learned in the experimental field as well, and on the other hand that such research has opened up the way to the defense of the deposit of supernatural truths entrusted to the Church....We promise again that it is our strongly-held intention, that the 'Pontifical Academicians' through their work and our Institution, work ever more and ever more effectively for the progress of the sciences. Of them we do not ask anything else, since in this praiseworthy intent and this noble work in that service in favor of the truth that we expect of them." (Pius XI)

Forty years later (10 November 1979), John Paul II once again emphasized the role and goals of the Academy, on the 100th anniversary (centenary) of the birth of Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics and one of the most prolific intellects in human history...

"...the existence of this Pontifical Academy of Sciences, of which in its ancient ancestry Galileo was a member and of which today eminent scientists are members, without any form of ethnic or religious discrimination, is a visible sign, raised amongst the peoples of the world, of the profound harmony that can exist between the truths of science and the truths of faith....The Church of Rome together with all the Churches spread throughout the world, attributes a great importance to the function of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences. The title of 'Pontifical' given to the Academy means, as you know, the interest and the commitment of the Church, in different forms from the ancient patronage, but no less profound and effective in character....How could the Church have lacked interest in the most noble of the occupations which are most strictly human -- the search for truth?"

"....Both believing scientists and non-believing scientists are involved in deciphering the palimpsest of nature which has been built in a rather complex way, where the traces of the different stages of the long evolution of the world have been covered over and mixed up. The believer, perhaps, has the advantage of knowing that the puzzle has a solution, that the underlying writing is in the final analysis the work of an intelligent being, and that thus the problem posed by nature has been posed to be solved and that its difficulty is without doubt proportionate to the present or future capacity of humanity. This, perhaps, will not give him new resources for the investigation engaged in. But it will contribute to maintaining him in that healthy optimism without which a sustained effort cannot be engaged in for long." (John Paul II)

Members

The new members of the Academy are elected by the body of Academicians and chosen from men and women of every race and religion based on the high scientific value of their activities and their high moral profile. They are then officially appointed by the Roman Pontiff. The Academy is governed by a President, appointed from its members by the Pope, who is helped by a scientific Council and by the Chancellor. Initially made up of 80 Academicians, 70 who were appointed for life, in 1986 John Paul II raised the number of members for life to 80, side by side with a limited number of Honorary Academicians chosen because they are highly qualified figures, and others who are Academicians because of the posts they hold, including: the Chancellor of the Academy, the Director of the Vatican Observatory

Vatican Observatory

The Vatican Observatory is an astronomical research and educational institution supported by the Holy See. Originally based in Rome, it now has headquarters and laboratory at the summer residence of the Pope in Castel Gandolfo, Italy, and an observatory at the Mount Graham International...

, the Prefect of the Vatican Apostolic Library, and the Prefect of the Vatican Secret Archives

Vatican Secret Archives

The Vatican Secret Archives , located in Vatican City, is the central repository for all of the acts promulgated by the Holy See. The Pope of the Roman Catholic Church, having primal incumbency until death, owns the archives until the next appointed Papal successor...

President

The president of the Academy is appointed from its members by the Pope. The current president is Nobel laureate Werner Arber

Werner Arber

Werner Arber is a Swiss microbiologist and geneticist. Along with American researchers Hamilton Smith and Daniel Nathans, Werner Arber shared the 1978 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery of restriction endonucleases...

, making him the first Protestant to hold the position.

Current ordinary members

Werner Arber

(1981- ) David Baltimore

David Baltimore

David Baltimore is an American biologist, university administrator, and Nobel laureate in Physiology or Medicine. He served as president of the California Institute of Technology from 1997 to 2006, and is currently the Robert A. Millikan Professor of Biology at Caltech...

(1978- ) Antonio M. Battro (2002- ) Gary Becker

Gary Becker

Gary Stanley Becker is an American economist. He is a professor of economics, sociology at the University of Chicago and a professor at the Booth School of Business. He was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1992, and received the United States' Presidential Medal of Freedom...

(1997- ) Daniel Adjei-Bekoe (1983- ) Paul Berg

Paul Berg

Paul Berg is an American biochemist and professor emeritus at Stanford University. He was the recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1980, along with Walter Gilbert and Frederick Sanger. The award recognized their contributions to basic research involving nucleic acids...

(1996- ) Enrico Berti (2001- ) Günter Blobel

Günter Blobel

-Biography:Blobel was born in Waltersdorf in the Prussian Province of Lower Silesia. In January 1945 his family fled from native Silesia from the advancing Red Army. On their way to the West they passed through the beautiful old city of Dresden, which left deep impressions in the young boy...

(2001- ) Thierry Boon-Falleur (2002- ) Luís Caffarelli

Luis Caffarelli

Luis A. Caffarelli is an Argentinian mathematician and leader in the field of partial differential equations and their applications....

(1994- ) Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza

Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza

Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza is an Italian population geneticist born in Genoa, who has been a professor at Stanford University since 1970 .-Books:...

(1994- ) Aaron Ciechanover

Aaron Ciechanover

Aaron Ciechanover is an Israeli biologist, and Nobel laureate in Chemistry.- Biography :Ciechanover was born in Haifa, British mandate of Palestine, a year before the establishment of the State of Israel...

(2007- ) Claude Cohen-Tannoudji

Claude Cohen-Tannoudji

Claude Cohen-Tannoudji is a French physicist and Nobel Laureate. He shared the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physics with Steven Chu and William Daniel Phillips for research in methods of laser cooling and trapping atoms...

(1999- ) Francis S. Collins (2009- ) Bernardo M. Colombo (1992- ) Suzanne Cory

Suzanne Cory

Suzanne Cory, AC, FAA, FRS is an Australian biologist.Cory is the current President of the Australian Academy of Science. She is the first-elected female President of the Academy and took office on 7 May 2010 for a five year term...

(2004- ) Paul J. Crutzen

Paul J. Crutzen

Paul Jozef Crutzen is a Dutch Nobel prize winning atmospheric chemist.Crutzen is best known for his research on ozone depletion. He lists his main research interests as “Stratospheric and tropospheric chemistry, and their role in the biogeochemical cycles and climate”...

(1996- ) Stanislas Dehaene

Stanislas Dehaene

Stanislas Dehaene is a professor at the Collège de France, author, and director of INSERM . He has worked on a number of topics, including numerical cognition, the neural basis of reading and the neural correlates of consciousness. Dehaene was one of ten people to be awarded the James S...

(2008- ) Edward M. De Robertis

Edward M. De Robertis

Edward Michael De Robertis is an embryologist whose work has contributed to the discovery of conserved molecular mechanisms of embryonic inductions that cause tissue differentiations during animal development.-Biography:...

(2009- ) Christian de Duve

Christian de Duve

Christian René, viscount de Duve is a Nobel Prize-winning cytologist and biochemist. De Duve was born in Thames Ditton, Surrey, Great Britain, as a son of Belgian refugees. They returned to Belgium in 1920...

(1970- )

Manfred Eigen

Manfred Eigen

Manfred Eigen is a German biophysical chemist who won the 1967 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for work on measuring fast chemical reactions.-Career:...

(1981- ) Gerhard Ertl

Gerhard Ertl

Gerhard Ertl is a German physicist and a Professor emeritus at the Department of Physical Chemistry, Fritz-Haber-Institut der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft in Berlin, Germany...

(2010- ) Albert Eschenmoser

Albert Eschenmoser

Albert Eschenmoser is a Swiss chemist working at the ETH Zurich and The Scripps Research Institute.His work together with Lavoslav Ružička on terpenes and the postulation of squalene cyclization to form lanosterol improved the insight into steroid biosynthesis.In the early 1960s, Eschenmoser began...

(1986- ) Antonio García-Bellido

Antonio Garcia-Bellido

Antonio García-Bellido ForMemRS is a Spanish Developmental biologist.-Life:He is Research Professor at the Spanish National Research Council since 1974.-External links:...

(2003- ) Takashi Gojobori

Takashi Gojobori

a Japanese molecular biologist, is Vice-Director of the National Institute of Genetics and Professor at Center for Information Biology and DNA Data Bank of Japan in NIG, Mishima, Japan...

(2007- ) Theodor W. Hänsch (2006- ) Stephen Hawking

Stephen Hawking

Stephen William Hawking, CH, CBE, FRS, FRSA is an English theoretical physicist and cosmologist, whose scientific books and public appearances have made him an academic celebrity...

(1986- ) Michał Heller (1990- ) Raymond Hide

Raymond Hide

Raymond Hide CBE FRS is a British physicist, who was formerly Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford. Since 2000, he has been Senior Research Investigator at Imperial College, London.-Life:...

(1996- ) Fotis Kafatos

Fotis Kafatos

Fotis Constantine Kafatos is a Greek molecular entomologist. Between 2005-2010 he was the founding president of the European Research Council and member of its Scientific Council...

(2003- ) Kr. Kasturirangan (2006- ) Vladimir Keilis-Borok

Vladimir Keilis-Borok

Vladimir Keilis-Borok was born in Moscow, Russia on July 31, 1921. He is a mathematical geophysicist.- Biography :In 1948, he received a Ph.D. in mathematical geophysics from the Academy of Sciences in Moscow. He was the founder, and is the Director Emeritus, of the International Institute of...

(2004- ) Klaus von Klitzing

Klaus von Klitzing

Klaus von Klitzing is a German physicist known for discovery of the integer quantum Hall Effect, for which he was awarded the 1985 Nobel Prize in Physics....

(2007- ) Nicole Marthe Le Douarin

Nicole Marthe Le Douarin

Nicole Marthe Le Douarin is a developmental biologist, famed for her studies of chimeras, which have led to critical insights regarding higher animal nervous and immune systems....

(1999- ) Tsung-Dao Lee

Tsung-Dao Lee

Tsung-Dao Lee is a Chinese born-American physicist, well known for his work on parity violation, the Lee Model, particle physics, relativistic heavy ion physics, nontopological solitons and soliton stars....

(2003- ) Yuan Tseh Lee (2007- ) Jean-Marie Lehn

Jean-Marie Lehn

Jean-Marie Lehn is a French chemist. He received the Nobel Prize together with Donald Cram and Charles Pedersen in 1987 for his work in Chemistry, particularly his synthesis of the cryptands...

(1996- ) Pierre Léna (2001- ) Rita Levi-Montalcini

Rita Levi-Montalcini

Rita Levi-Montalcini , Knight Grand Cross is an Italian neurologist who, together with colleague Stanley Cohen, received the 1986 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their discovery of nerve growth factor...

(1974- )

Félix Malu wa Kalenga (1983- ) Yuri Ivanovich Manin (1996- ) Govind Menon (1981- ) Beatrice Mintz

Beatrice Mintz

Beatrice Mintz is an American female embryologist who has contributed to the understanding of genetic modification, cellular differentiation and cancer, particularly melanoma....

(1986- ) Jürgen Mittelstrass (2002- ) Mario J. Molina

Mario J. Molina

Mario José Molina-Pasquel Henríquez is a Mexican chemist and one of the most prominent precursors to the discovering of the Antarctic ozone hole. He was a co-recipient Mario José Molina-Pasquel Henríquez (born March 19, 1943 in Mexico City) is a Mexican chemist and one of the most prominent...

(2000- ) Rudolf Muradyan (1994- ) Joseph Murray

Joseph Murray

Joseph Edward Murray is a retired American plastic surgeon. He performed the first successful human kidney transplant on identical twins on December 23, 1954....

(1996- ) Miguel Nicolelis

Miguel Nicolelis

Miguel Angelo Laporta Nicolelis, MD, PhD, is a Brazilian physician and scientist, best known for his pioneering work in "reading monkey thought". He and his colleagues implanted electrode arrays into a monkey's brain that were able to detect the monkey's motor intent and thus able to control...

(2011- ) Sergej Novikov (1996- ) Ryōji Noyori

Ryoji Noyori

is a Japanese chemist. He won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2001. Noyori shared half of the prize with William S. Knowles for the study of chirally catalyzed hydrogenations; the second half of the Prize went to K. Barry Sharpless for his study in chirally catalyzed oxidation reactions...

(2002- ) Czeslaw Olech (1986- ) William D. Phillips (2004- ) John Charles Polanyi

John Charles Polanyi

John Charles Polanyi, PC, CC, FRSC, O.Ont, FRS, born January 23, 1929) is a Canadian chemist who won the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, for his research in chemical kinetics. Polanyi was educated at Manchester University, and did postdoctoral research at the National Research Council in Canada and...

(1986- ) Ingo Potrykus

Ingo Potrykus

Ingo Potrykus was full Professor of Plant Sciences, specifically of Biotechnology of Plants, at the Institute of Plant Sciences of the ETH Zurich from June 1, 1987 until his retirement on April 1, 1999. His research group applied gene-technology to contribute to food security in developing countries...

(2005- ) Frank Press

Frank Press

Frank Press is an American geophysicist.Born in Brooklyn, New York, Press was science advisor to President Jimmy Carter from1976 to 1980,and president of the U.S. NationalAcademy of Sciences from 1981 to 1993...

(1999- ) Yves Quéré (2003- ) V. Ramanathan

Veerabhadran Ramanathan

Veerabhadran Ramanathan is Victor Alderson Professor of Applied Ocean Sciences and director of the Center for Atmospheric Sciences at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego. He has contributed to many areas of the atmospheric sciences including developments to...

(2004- ) Chintamani Rao (1990- )

Peter H. Raven

Peter H. Raven

Peter Hamilton Raven is a botanist and environmentalist, notable as the longtime director, now President Emeritus, of the Missouri Botanical Garden.-Early life:...

(1990- ) Martin J. Rees (1990- ) Alexander Rich

Alexander Rich

Alexander Rich, MD is a biologist and biophysicist. He is the William Thompson Sedgwick Professor of Biophysics at MIT and Harvard Medical School. Dr. Rich earned both an A.B. and an M.D. from Harvard University. He was a post-doc of Linus Pauling along with James Watson...

(1978- ) Ignacio Rodríguez-Iturbe

Ignacio Rodriguez-Iturbe

Ignacio Rodriguez-Iturbe is a Venezuelan scientist. He currently serves as the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor at Princeton University...

(2007- ) Carlo Rubbia

Carlo Rubbia

Carlo Rubbia Knight Grand Cross is an Italian particle physicist and inventor who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1984 with Simon van der Meer for work leading to the discovery of the W and Z particles at CERN.-Biography:...

(1985- ) Vera Rubin

Vera Rubin

Vera Rubin is an American astronomer who pioneered work on galaxy rotation rates. She is famous for uncovering the discrepancy between the predicted angular motion of galaxies and the observed motion, by studying galactic rotation curves...

(1996- ) Roald Sagdeev

Roald Sagdeev

Roald Zinnurovich Sagdeev is a Soviet and Russian expert in plasma physics and former director of the Space Research Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences. He was also a science advisor to Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev. Sagdeev graduated from Moscow State University. He is a member of the...

(1990- ) Michael Sela

Michael Sela

Michael Sela is an Israeli immunologist of Polish Jewish origin. He is W. Garfield Weston Professor of Immunology at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot.- Birth and academic career :...

(1975- ) Maxine Singer

Maxine Singer

Maxine Frank Singer is an American molecular biologist and science administrator. She is known for her contributions to solving the genetic code, her role in the ethical and regulatory debates on recombinant DNA techniques , and her leadership of Carnegie Institution of Washington.Singer...

(1986- ) Wolf Singer (1992- ) Govind Swarup

Govind Swarup

Professor Govind Swarup, of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research , is an internationally renowned radio astronomer and one of the pioneers of radio astronomy...

(2008- ) Andrzej Szczeklik

Andrzej Szczeklik

Andrzej Szczeklik is a Polish physician, professor and chairman of the Department of Medicine, Jagiellonian University School of Medicine in Kraków....

(1994- ) Walter Thirring

Walter Thirring

Walter Thirring is an Austrian physicist after whom the Thirring model in quantum field theory is named. He is son of the physicist Hans Thirring, co-discoverer of the Lense-Thirring frame dragging effect in general relativity....

(1986- ) Charles Hard Townes

Charles Hard Townes

(1983- ) Hans Tuppy

Hans Tuppy

Hans Tuppy is a biochemist who participated in the sequencing of insulin, and became Austria's first university professor for biochemistry. He was Austrian Minister for Science and Research from 1987−1989.- Family background and youth :...

(1970- ) Rafael Vicuña (2000- ) Edward Witten

Edward Witten

Edward Witten is an American theoretical physicist with a focus on mathematical physics who is currently a professor of Mathematical Physics at the Institute for Advanced Study....

(2006- ) Chen Ning Yang (1997- ) Ahmed Zewail

Ahmed Zewail

Ahmed Hassan Zewail is an Egyptian-American scientist who won the 1999 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work on femtochemistry. He is the Linus Pauling Chair Professor Chemistry and Professor of Physics at the California Institute of Technology.- Birth and education :Ahmed Zewail was born on...

(1999- ) Antonino Zichichi

Antonino Zichichi

Antonino Zichichi is an Italian physicist who has worked in the field of nuclear physics.-Biography:Zichichi was born in Trapani, Sicily, in 1929. He has collaborated to several important discoveries in the field of subnuclear physics and has worked in some of the most important research...

(2000- )

Current honorary members

Georges Cottier, O.P. (1992- ) Jean-Michel Maldamé, O.P. (1997- ) Carlo Maria Martini

Carlo Maria Martini

Carlo Maria Martini, SJ is an Italian Cardinal of the Catholic Church. He was Archbishop of Milan from 1980 to 2002, and was elevated to the cardinalate in 1983.-Early life and education:...

, S.J. (2000- )

Current members perdurante munere

Note: These members are ex officio members, i.e., they serve during the term of their office. Chancellor

Chancellor (education)

A chancellor or vice-chancellor is the chief executive of a university. Other titles are sometimes used, such as president or rector....

of the Academy: Marcelo Sánchez Sorondo

Marcelo Sánchez Sorondo

Marcelo Sánchez Sorondo was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on 8 September 1942. He was ordained a priest on 7 December 1968 in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Buenos Aires. At the St. Thomas Aquinas University of Rome he was awarded a Ph.D...

(1998- ) Director of the Vatican Observatory

Vatican Observatory

: José Funes

José Gabriel Funes

Fr. José Gabriel Funes, S.J. , an Argentine Jesuit priest and astronomer, is the current director of the Vatican Observatory.-Biography:...

, S.J. (2006- ) Prefect of the Vatican Apostolic Library: Cesare Pasini (2007- ) Prefect of the Vatican Secret Archives

Vatican Secret Archives

: Sergio Pagano

Sergio Pagano

Sergio Pagano B is a Roman Catholic bishop and the Prefect of the Vatican Secret Archives.Pagano became a member of the Congregation of the Barnabites in 1966...

, B.

Barnabites

The Barnabites, or Clerics Regular of Saint Paul is a Roman Catholic order.-Establishment of the Order :It was founded in 1530 by three Italian noblemen: St. Anthony Mary Zaccaria The Barnabites, or Clerics Regular of Saint Paul (Latin: Clerici Regulares Sancti Pauli, abbr. B.) is a Roman Catholic...

(1997- )

Nobel Prize-winning members

During its various decades of activity, the Academy has had a number of Nobel Prize

Nobel Prize

The Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...

winners amongst its members, many of whom were appointed Academicians before they received this prestigious international award. These include:

Ernest Rutherford
Ernest Rutherford
Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson OM, FRS was a New Zealand-born British chemist and physicist who became known as the father of nuclear physics...

(Chemistry, 1908)
Guglielmo Marconi
Guglielmo Marconi
Guglielmo Marconi was an Italian inventor, known as the father of long distance radio transmission and for his development of Marconi's law and a radio telegraph system. Marconi is often credited as the inventor of radio, and indeed he shared the 1909 Nobel Prize in Physics with Karl Ferdinand...

(Physics, 1909)
Alexis Carrel
Alexis Carrel
Alexis Carrel was a French surgeon and biologist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1912 for pioneering vascular suturing techniques. He invented the first perfusion pump with Charles A. Lindbergh opening the way to organ transplantation...

(Physiology, 1912)
Max von Laue
Max von Laue
Max Theodor Felix von Laue was a German physicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1914 for his discovery of the diffraction of X-rays by crystals...

(Physics, 1914)
Max Planck
Max Planck
Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck, ForMemRS, was a German physicist who actualized the quantum physics, initiating a revolution in natural science and philosophy. He is regarded as the founder of the quantum theory, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918.-Life and career:Planck came...

(Physics, 1918)
Niels Bohr
Niels Bohr
Niels Henrik David Bohr was a Danish physicist who made foundational contributions to understanding atomic structure and quantum mechanics, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922. Bohr mentored and collaborated with many of the top physicists of the century at his institute in...

(Physics, 1922)
Werner Heisenberg
Werner Heisenberg
Werner Karl Heisenberg was a German theoretical physicist who made foundational contributions to quantum mechanics and is best known for asserting the uncertainty principle of quantum theory...

(Physics, 1932)
Paul Dirac
Paul Dirac
Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac, OM, FRS was an English theoretical physicist who made fundamental contributions to the early development of both quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics...

(Physics, 1933)
Erwin Schrödinger
Erwin Schrödinger
Erwin Rudolf Josef Alexander Schrödinger was an Austrian physicist and theoretical biologist who was one of the fathers of quantum mechanics, and is famed for a number of important contributions to physics, especially the Schrödinger equation, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1933...

(Physics, 1933)
Peter J.W. Debye (Chemistry, 1936)
Otto Hahn
Otto Hahn
Otto Hahn FRS was a German chemist and Nobel laureate, a pioneer in the fields of radioactivity and radiochemistry. He is regarded as "the father of nuclear chemistry". Hahn was a courageous opposer of Jewish persecution by the Nazis and after World War II he became a passionate campaigner...

(Chemistry, 1944)
Sir Alexander Fleming (Physiology, 1945)
Chen Ning Yang and Tsung-Dao Lee
Tsung-Dao Lee
Tsung-Dao Lee is a Chinese born-American physicist, well known for his work on parity violation, the Lee Model, particle physics, relativistic heavy ion physics, nontopological solitons and soliton stars....

(Physics, 1957)
Joshua Lederberg
Joshua Lederberg
Joshua Lederberg ForMemRS was an American molecular biologist known for his work in microbial genetics, artificial intelligence, and the United States space program. He was just 33 years old when he won the 1958 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for discovering that bacteria can mate and...

(Physiology, 1958)
Rudolf Mössbauer (Physics, 1961)
Max F. Perutz (Chemistry, 1962)
John Carew Eccles
John Carew Eccles
John Carew Eccles, AC FRS FRACP FRSNZ FAAS was an Australian neurophysiologist who won the 1963 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work on the synapse. He shared the prize with Andrew Huxley and Alan Lloyd Hodgkin....

(Physiology, 1963)
Charles H. Townes (Physics, 1964)
Manfred Eigen
Manfred Eigen
Manfred Eigen is a German biophysical chemist who won the 1967 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for work on measuring fast chemical reactions.-Career:...

and George Porter
George Porter
George Hornidge Porter, Baron Porter of Luddenham, OM, FRS was a British chemist.- Life :Porter was born in Stainforth, near Thorne, South Yorkshire. He was educated at Thorne Grammar School, then won a scholarship to the University of Leeds and gained his first degree in chemistry...

(Chemistry, 1967)
Har Gobind Khorana and Marshall W. Nirenberg (Physiology, 1968)
Christian de Duve
Christian de Duve
Christian René, viscount de Duve is a Nobel Prize-winning cytologist and biochemist. De Duve was born in Thames Ditton, Surrey, Great Britain, as a son of Belgian refugees. They returned to Belgium in 1920...

(Physiology, 1974)
George Emil Palade
George Emil Palade
George Emil Palade was a Romanian cell biologist. Described as "the most influential cell biologist ever", in 1974 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine, together with Albert Claude and Christian de Duve. The prize was granted for his innovations in electron microscopy and...

(Physiology, 1974)

David Baltimore
David Baltimore
David Baltimore is an American biologist, university administrator, and Nobel laureate in Physiology or Medicine. He served as president of the California Institute of Technology from 1997 to 2006, and is currently the Robert A. Millikan Professor of Biology at Caltech...

(Physiology, 1975)
Aage Bohr (Physics, 1975)
Abdus Salam
Abdus Salam
Mohammad Abdus Salam, NI, SPk Mohammad Abdus Salam, NI, SPk Mohammad Abdus Salam, NI, SPk (Urdu: محمد عبد السلام, pronounced , (January 29, 1926– November 21, 1996) was a Pakistani theoretical physicist and Nobel laureate in Physics for his work on the electroweak unification of the...

(Physics, 1979)
Paul Berg
Paul Berg
Paul Berg is an American biochemist and professor emeritus at Stanford University. He was the recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1980, along with Walter Gilbert and Frederick Sanger. The award recognized their contributions to basic research involving nucleic acids...

(Chemistry, 1980)
Kai Siegbahn
Kai Siegbahn
Kai Manne Börje Siegbahn was a Swedish physicist.He was born in Lund, Sweden, and his father Manne Siegbahn also won the Nobel Prize in Physics, in 1924. Siegbahn earned his doctorate at the University of Stockholm in 1944...

(Physics, 1981)
Sune Bergstrom
Sune Bergström
Karl Sune Detlof Bergström was a Swedish biochemist.In 1975, he was appointed to the Nobel Foundation Board of Directors in Sweden....

(Physiology, 1982)
Carlo Rubbia
Carlo Rubbia
Carlo Rubbia Knight Grand Cross is an Italian particle physicist and inventor who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1984 with Simon van der Meer for work leading to the discovery of the W and Z particles at CERN.-Biography:...

(Physics, 1984)
Klaus von Klitzing
Klaus von Klitzing
Klaus von Klitzing is a German physicist known for discovery of the integer quantum Hall Effect, for which he was awarded the 1985 Nobel Prize in Physics....

(Physics, 1985)
Rita Levi-Montalcini
Rita Levi-Montalcini
Rita Levi-Montalcini , Knight Grand Cross is an Italian neurologist who, together with colleague Stanley Cohen, received the 1986 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their discovery of nerve growth factor...

(Physiology, 1986)
John C. Polanyi (Chemistry, 1986)
Yuan Tseh Lee (Chemistry, 1986)
Jean-Marie Lehn
Jean-Marie Lehn
Jean-Marie Lehn is a French chemist. He received the Nobel Prize together with Donald Cram and Charles Pedersen in 1987 for his work in Chemistry, particularly his synthesis of the cryptands...

(Chemistry, 1987)
Joseph E. Murray (Physiology, 1990)
Gary S. Becker (Economics, 1992)
Paul J. Crutzen
Paul J. Crutzen
Paul Jozef Crutzen is a Dutch Nobel prize winning atmospheric chemist.Crutzen is best known for his research on ozone depletion. He lists his main research interests as “Stratospheric and tropospheric chemistry, and their role in the biogeochemical cycles and climate”...

and Mario J. Molina
Mario J. Molina
Mario José Molina-Pasquel Henríquez is a Mexican chemist and one of the most prominent precursors to the discovering of the Antarctic ozone hole. He was a co-recipient Mario José Molina-Pasquel Henríquez (born March 19, 1943 in Mexico City) is a Mexican chemist and one of the most prominent...

(Chemistry, 1995)
Claude Cohen-Tannoudji
Claude Cohen-Tannoudji
Claude Cohen-Tannoudji is a French physicist and Nobel Laureate. He shared the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physics with Steven Chu and William Daniel Phillips for research in methods of laser cooling and trapping atoms...

(Physics, 1997)
Ahmed H. Zewail (Chemistry, 1999)
Günter Blobel
Günter Blobel
-Biography:Blobel was born in Waltersdorf in the Prussian Province of Lower Silesia. In January 1945 his family fled from native Silesia from the advancing Red Army. On their way to the West they passed through the beautiful old city of Dresden, which left deep impressions in the young boy...

(Physiology, 1999)
Ryoji Noyori
Ryoji Noyori
is a Japanese chemist. He won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2001. Noyori shared half of the prize with William S. Knowles for the study of chirally catalyzed hydrogenations; the second half of the Prize went to K. Barry Sharpless for his study in chirally catalyzed oxidation reactions...

(Chemistry, 2001)
Aaron Ciechanover
Aaron Ciechanover
Aaron Ciechanover is an Israeli biologist, and Nobel laureate in Chemistry.- Biography :Ciechanover was born in Haifa, British mandate of Palestine, a year before the establishment of the State of Israel...

(Chemistry, 2004)
Gerhard Ertl
Gerhard Ertl
Gerhard Ertl is a German physicist and a Professor emeritus at the Department of Physical Chemistry, Fritz-Haber-Institut der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft in Berlin, Germany...

(Chemistry, 2007)

Other eminent Academicians include Padre Agostino Gemelli

Agostino Gemelli

Agostino Gemelli was an Italian physician, Franciscan friar and psychologist who was also the founder and chancellor of Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan in 1921....

(1878–1959), founder of the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart and President of the Academy after its re-foundation until 1959, and Mons. Georges Lemaitre

Georges Lemaître

Monsignor Georges Henri Joseph Édouard Lemaître was a Belgian priest, astronomer and professor of physics at the Catholic University of Louvain. He was the first person to propose the theory of the expansion of the Universe, widely misattributed to Edwin Hubble...

(1894–1966), one of the fathers of contemporary cosmology who held the office of President from 1960 to 1966, and Brazilian neuroscientist Carlos Chagas Filho

Carlos Chagas Filho

Carlos Chagas Filho was a Brazilian physician, biologist and scientist active in the field of neuroscience. He was internationally renowned for his investigations on the neural mechanisms underlying the phenomenon of electrogenesis by the electroplaques of electric fishes...

Source

Based on The Pontifical Academy of Sciences: A Historical Profile (in PDF)

External links

The Pontifical Academy of Sciences -- The Academy's official Vatican site
Message to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences on Evolution by Pope John Paul II, 22 October 1996
History
Photo Galleries
Article about inner workings and relationship to other councils

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

History

Activities

Goals and Hopes of the Academy

Members

President

Current ordinary members

Current honorary members

Current members perdurante munere

Nobel Prize-winning members

See also

Source

External links