The Wolf Prizes in medicine, chemistry and physics recognize research into the sense of taste, methods for sequencing DNA and advances in controlling cold atoms.
Alongside the mathematics prize for two Israeli researchersOn October 1, 2026, the Wolf Foundation announced six additional laureates in medicine, chemistry, and physics. The winners were announced at the President's Residence in Jerusalem; the awards are scheduled for June 2027.
Medicine: How does the brain recognize taste?
Professor Charles S. Zucker of Columbia University and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute is the recipient of the Wolf Prize in Medicine. The Wolf Foundation selected him for research that has transformed our understanding of the sense of taste. His work identified sensory cells and receptors involved in the perception of sweet, sour, bitter, salty, and umami, and explored the neural pathways that transmit information from the tongue to the brain.
The important distinction is between the detection of a substance in the mouth and the experience that the brain gives to the signal. Zucker and his colleagues have shown how different neural pathways carry information about different types of taste. This is basic research on the sensory system, not the announcement of a new medical treatment.
Charles Zucker: Why does a bitter substance cause rejection?
The question is not just which substance binds to which receptor on the tongue, but how that activity becomes meaningful in the brain. Zucker and his colleagues studied the cells and receptors involved in sensing the five basic taste qualities: sweet, sour, bitter, salty, and umami. They combined genetic tools, neural measurements, and behavioral experiments to link chemical recognition to response.
One of the experiments described on the award website illustrated the difference between a receptor and a neural pathway. The researchers induced mice to express a receptor that detects a bitter substance precisely in the cells that normally participate in the sensation of sweetness. Under the experimental conditions, the same substances activated this pathway and the mice showed attraction to them instead of repulsion. It is impossible to ask a mouse what exactly it felt, so the direct finding is a change in behavior.
The experiment shows that the response is not determined solely by the identity of the substance or receptor. It is also important what type of cell was activated and to which pathways in the brain it is connected. This is a causal experiment: Instead of being satisfied with the correlation between taste and neural activity, we change a component of the system and see how the response changes. In further experiments, inserting human receptors into the taste cells of mice changed their preferences, demonstrating how differences in receptors contribute to differences in sensitivity and preference.
Deciphering these mechanisms does not mean that the entire eating experience is reduced to five tastes. Smell, texture, experience, and body state also participate in the experience. Zucker's contribution is to clarify a specific and important part of the chain: how a chemical signal is detected in sensory cells and how their activation drives a neural and behavioral response.
Chemistry: Three paths that have made genome reading cheaper
The Wolf Prize in Chemistry will be awarded to Professor Shankar Balasubramanian and Professor David Klenerman of the University of Cambridge, and Professor Pascal Mayer of France. The award is for the development of methods for large-scale, low-cost DNA sequencing, which have expanded the possibilities in genomic research and genomic medicine.
Balasubramanian and Klenerman were among the developers of the approach that led to the simultaneous sequencing of large numbers of DNA fragments and the company Solexa. Mayer conceived and developed a method for amplifying DNA fragments on a surface, so that each fragment creates a stack of copies that can be read. The stack technology was later integrated into the sequencing platform. Therefore, the joint award recognizes complementary contributions: the reading chemistry, amplification, and engineering that made large-scale sequencing practical.
Faster and cheaper sequencing allows researchers to compare genomes, study tumors, and identify genetic changes. Genomic testing in itself is not a definitive diagnosis for every disease, and a distinction must be made between the ability to read a sequence and its medical interpretation.
Chemistry: How can millions of DNA segments be read at once?
DNA sequencing is the determination of the order of the four types of bases marked with the letters A, C, G, and T. The human genome contains billions of bases, so even an accurate method for reading a single segment is not enough if it is slow and expensive. The challenge was to transform a small laboratory operation into a process that performs a huge number of reads simultaneously.
In the approach developed for the Solexa/Illumina platform, DNA is divided into segments and attached to a surface in a flow cell. Each segment serves as a template for making copies, and the system reads the sequence of bases by building a complementary strand. An enzyme called DNA polymerase adds a base to the strand that matches the base in the template. Fluorescent labeling allows the addition to be detected by photography, and the accumulation of signals over the reading cycles creates a sequence.
Parallelism is the crucial change: the same chemical cycle occurs at many sites, and the camera reads the sites together. The computer translates the images into sequences, which can be compared to a reference genome or used to reconstruct a sequence. The device does not read an entire chromosome from start to finish in a single pass, but rather collects information from many segments and processes it.
Shankar to Subramanian: Turning DNA synthesis into a reading method
The official description of the Wolf Foundation emphasizes Balasubramanian's contribution to the transition from single-molecule DNA synthesis research to a parallel enzymatic method on a surface. His work combined fluorescently labeled bases, appropriate enzymes, and controlled material flow. Together with Klenerman, he was a co-founder of Solexa.
To read a sequence cycle by cycle, you need to prevent the enzyme from adding many bases before the camera has had time to measure. The solution in the synthesis sequencing method is to use bases with a temporary block: after the addition, you take a picture, remove the block and the marker, and then start the next cycle. In this way, each picture adds information about the next position in the sequence. Removing the block is just as essential as stopping synthesis, because the goal is to repeat the process over and over again.
David Klenerman: Seeing the enzyme in action
Klenerman contributed tools from physical chemistry and single-molecule imaging. According to the award website, his experience in fluorescence microscopy and the mechanism of action of DNA polymerase was a key component in the path from basic biochemical observations to a high-throughput sequencing platform.
The challenge is not limited to inventing a colored label. A measurement system must distinguish between real signal and background, identify the added base, and maintain reliability over many cycles. This is where the chemistry of the label, the optics of the device, and the behavior of the enzyme come together. Klenerman’s partnership with Balasubramanian connected the understanding of the chemical reaction with the ability to measure it.
Pascal Meyer: DNA colonies that amplify the signal
Mayer's contribution was the idea of DNA colonies: amplifying fragments directly on a surface, so that each fragment creates a local colony of identical copies. The award website describes an idea he conceived in 1996, filed for patent applications in 1997, and presented experimental proof in 1998. The technology was later developed at Manteia and combined with Solexa's separate sequencing chemistry.
Such a colony solves a simple measurement problem: a single molecule's light signal is weak, while many copies of the same template can provide a signal that is easier to detect. Because the copies remain in a defined area on the surface, the signal of one colony can be separated from that of its neighbors. This is not a bacterial colony, but a collection of DNA copies.
This brought together two complementary capabilities: the creation of a dense array of reading templates and the controlled addition of bases for sequence identification. The progress also relied on flow cell engineering, automated photography, and computer analysis. Its importance is the expansion of the scope of genomic research and the possibility of investigating genetic differences and diseases using many more samples.
Physics: Cold Atoms and Precise Clocks
The Wolf Prize in Physics will be shared between Prof. Immanuel Bloch, of the Max Planck Institute and the University of Munich, and Prof. Jun Ye of the University of Colorado and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The award citation highlights advances in controlling systems of very cold atoms.
Bloch uses atoms trapped in light lattices to simulate and study complex quantum systems: when atoms are arranged in a controlled environment, it is possible to observe how collective properties of matter are created and changed. Ye has developed optical atomic clocks with extremely high precision and stability. These clocks are also used as experimental tools for fundamental questions, for example, to examine the effects of the theory of relativity or the stability of physical constants.
Despite the connection between the two types of experiments through the control of atoms, these are different scientific achievements: simulation of quantum matter on the one hand, and measurement of time and frequency with extreme precision on the other.
Immanuel Bloch: A quantum matter laboratory built from atoms and light
In a solid, properties such as conduction and insulation arise from the joint behavior of many particles. When the interactions between them are strong, calculating the system can be very difficult. Bloch has developed an experimental way to study such problems using ultracold atoms trapped in an optical lattice—an array of traps created by laser light.
Rather than simply measuring an existing material, researchers build a system in which the experimental conditions can be changed in a controlled manner. Atoms are not electrons in a metal, but a suitable system of atoms can realize a model of multi-particle quantum behavior. This is the idea of quantum simulation: a controlled quantum system is used to study another quantum system or model.
The Wolf Foundation cites Bloch's observation of the transition from a bosonic superfluid to a Mott insulator among his achievements. In a superfluid, a shared quantum state supports coherent motion; in a Mott insulator, interactions restrict the movement of atoms between lattice sites. Unlike insulation explained solely by single-particle behavior, this behavior is driven primarily by interactions between particles.
Bloch was also a pioneer of quantum gas microscopy, which allows the study of the system at the level of lattice sites. The move from measuring the average of a cloud of atoms to examining its microscopic structure opened up a way to examine quantum connections and order between particles. These are tools for studying matter; there is no need to present each such experiment as a general quantum computer to understand its importance.
Jun Ye: A watch that is a device for studying the laws of nature
An atomic clock uses the transition between energy levels in an atom as a reference for frequency. In an optical clock, the transition is measured using high-frequency light, rather than microwaves. Ye’s group uses cold atoms and light traps, along with very stable lasers, to make precise measurements of this transition.
There is a subtle difficulty here: The instruments that hold the atoms can also change the result. The trapping light, the environment, and the interactions between the atoms can shift the transition frequency. The Wolf Prize website emphasizes the careful control of these factors and the development of stable lasers. The accuracy of a clock depends not only on the number of oscillations it counts, but also on the ability to detect and reduce systematic effects.
The study, reported by NIST in July 2024, used a finer light lattice, which reduced the effects of trapping light and interactions between atoms. Measuring many atoms together adds information and improves the clock's performance. This is an example of how control of a quantum system translates into a useful measurement.
The uses go beyond telling time. General relativity predicts that a change in altitude, and therefore in gravitational potential, slightly alters the rate of a clock. In 2022, the JILA team reported measuring such a difference within a cloud of atoms about a millimeter thick. Comparing clocks can therefore be used to test relativity and measure gravitational potential. The prize website also mentions searching for changes in fundamental constants and contributions to the development of nuclear clocks, which rely on transitions in the atomic nucleus.
Questions and Answers
Did all six researchers win for the same discovery?
No. The prizes are given in three different fields: Zucker in medicine; Balasubramanian, Klenerman and Mayer in chemistry; and Bloch and Via in physics.
When will the prize be awarded?
According to the announcement report, in June 2027. On October 1, 2026, the names of the 2026 winners were announced.
Sources
- Wolf Fund: Charles Zucker
- Wolf Fund: Shankar Balasubramanian
- Wolf Foundation: David Klenerman
- Wolf Fund: Pascal Meyer
- Wolf Foundation: Emmanuel Bloch
- Wolf Fund: John Yeh
- Ye Group's research on optical clock performance
- NIST: Improving the optical clock in research from 2024
- NIST: Measuring relativity at the millimeter scale
- Illumina: How sequencing by synthesis works
One response
There is a spelling error on the third Laureate: Prof. Pascal MAYER (mAyer not mEyer).