The Hong Kong Science Museum unveiled the Shaw Prize 2025 Exhibition, celebrating the outstanding accomplishments of four scientists in the fields of astronomy, life sciences, and mathematics.
Occupying the main lobby of the museum, this special exhibition is jointly organized by The Hong Kong Science Museum and The Shaw Prize Foundation. It introduces the public to the achievements and life journeys of this year’s Shaw Prize awardees, and provides a hands-on experience to learn scientific concepts through interactive panels.
Established by businessman Run Run Shaw in 2002, the Foundation in his name presented the inaugural Shaw Prize in 2004, which consists of three annual awards: The Prize in Astronomy, the Prize in Life Science and Medicine, and the Prize in Mathematical Sciences.
Honoring individuals who have made outstanding contributions and significant advances to the three fields, the Prize consists of a medal, certificate, and a monetary award of US$1.2 million since 2016. Between 2004 and 2025, 67 Shaw Prizes were awarded to 114 individuals.
Since 2014, the Shaw Prize Foundation has worked with the Science Museum to present the accomplishments of the year’s Shaw Prize awardees and promote scientific literacy to the general public. Tonya Tai, the Secretariat of the Shaw Prize, said the museum helps make the laureates’ work more accessible to the public.
Tai noted, “Since much of the award-winning research is in basic science, the exhibition highlights how these discoveries can be connected to real-life applications, helping visitors see their impact on the world around us.”
This year’s winners of the Shaw Prize in Astronomy are John Richard Bond from the University of Toronto and George Efstathiou from the University of Cambridge, for their pioneering work in cosmology and studies of fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background. Bond and Efstathiou’s work in using the background as a cosmological probe helped cosmologists determine the age and geometrical shape of the universe, as well as cosmological changes through the content of dark matter and dark energy. By examining the fluctuations within the background, the two awardees were able to create models related to the history and mass-energy composition in the universe, later verified by scientific instruments on Earth and in space.
In this year’s Shaw Prize in Life Science & Medicine, Wolfgang Baumeister from the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry was awarded for his work in cryogenic-electron tomography (cryo-ET). Cryo-ET is an imaging technique that allows scientists to visualize biological samples, including proteins and cellular compartments, at the atomic level and in their natural setting. Baumeister’s pioneering development of this technique allows researchers in structural biology to examine how biological molecules interact in cellular environments, and is transforming biologists’ understanding of normal life processes.
Meanwhile, this year’s Shaw Prize in Mathematical Sciences went to Kenji Fukaya from the Beijing Institute of Mathematical Sciences and Applications for his work in envisioning the Fukaya category within the field of symplectic geometry. The Fukaya category helped organize and understand the relationships of Lagrangians, complex geometric objects in symplectic spaces. Fukaya’s work helped mathematicians understand the shape of the behavior of complex geometric objects, which have applications in physics and other parts of mathematics.
To help the public engage with significant advances in science and mathematics, the exhibition features interactive panels to explain concepts that may be challenging to grasp. These panels enable visitors to have a firsthand exploration of the key advances related to this year’s awardees and provide context in explaining the importance of their work to the scientific community.
Sophia Chen, an education student from Guangzhou Huashang College, visited the exhibition with her friends after a recommendation from her professor. “I really liked the hands-on experiences in the exhibition; it was very fun,” Chen said.
Many visitors brought their families to visit the exhibition, with parents hoping to educate their children about the importance of scientific discovery. Some young children enthusiastically played with the interactive panels, while other families took their time to read and learn about this year’s awardees.
Jia Liu, another visitor who brought her husband and two children to the exhibition, said her family is interested in the Shaw Prize awardees after learning about the awarding ceremony on the news. “My children are very interested in mathematics, and the Japanese professor who was awarded in that category works at Tsinghua University,” Liu said. “My family are Tsinghua graduates, so we want to take a look at the exhibition.”
The exhibition is open free to the public until Dec. 17.