At the MPI of Biochemistry, Petra Schwille has made it her goal to understand the fundamental principles of life. In order to do so, she is investigating self-assembly processes of biomolecules that may have been crucial for the development of the first cells. Through her work, she aims to gain new insights into basic principles of evolution, and thus into the emergence of the complexity of biological life. Ultimately, the physico-chemical prerequisites for the formation of the phenomenon of life are to be uncovered.
Petra Schwille has already been awarded various prizes, including the Philip Morris Research Prize in 2004, the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize of the German Research Foundation in 2010 and the Bavarian Order of Maximilian in 2018.
About the Otto Warburg Medal
The medal was named after the biochemist, physiologist and Nobel Prize Laureate Otto Heinrich Warburg. In his honor, the first award ceremony took place on the occasion of his 80th birthday in 1963. The Otto Warburg Medal is the highest award for biochemists and molecular biologists in Germany and is awarded for first-class research results with international recognition.
