Prof. Agnieszka Chacińska has received the first Polish Academy of Sciences (PAS) Award. The award was presented during a session of the PAS General Assembly marking the Academy's 75th anniversary.
Dr Marcin Kulasek, Prof. Agnieszka Chacińska, Prof. Marek Konarzewski
The PAS Award recognises research conducted in Poland that stands out for its high quality, its development potential and its prospects of winning the world's most prestigious accolades. It has now been presented for the first time and is worth PLN 400,000.
The winner of the PAS Award, Prof. Agnieszka Chacińska, is a molecular biologist and director of the International Institute of Molecular Mechanisms and Machines of the Polish Academy of Sciences. Her research interests lie in cell biochemistry and the molecular aspects of cell biology, in particular the biogenesis, transport and degradation of mitochondrial proteins and their malfunction leading to pathology. Her research focuses on the links between the transport of mitochondrial proteins and cellular protein homeostasis. The work of Prof. Chacińska and her team is important for understanding many diseases, such as mitochondrial diseases – rare, genetically based conditions with a severe course – as well as common lifestyle diseases, metabolic disorders, neurodegeneration, age-related dementia and cancers.
Prof. Agnieszka Chacińska has won numerous research awards as well as international and national grant competitions; her team's work is funded, among other sources, by the National Science Centre through five OPUS grants and a MAESTRO grant.
Our warmest congratulations to the laureate!