Else Kröner Fresenius Prize for Medical Research 2027: €2.5 Million for a Scientist Advancing Cell-Based Immunotherapies, With €500,000 Personal and €2 Million for Future Research

Else Kröner Fresenius Prize for Medical Research 2027: €2.5 Million for a Scientist Advancing Cell-Based Immunotherapies, With €500,000 Personal and €2 Million for Future Research

The Else Kröner Fresenius Prize for Medical Research is one of the largest international science awards a single researcher can win. For the 2027 edition, the Else Kröner-Fresenius-Stiftung will award €2.5 million to one scientist whose work has meaningfully advanced cell-based immunotherapies — the field of engineering immune cells, inside or outside the body, to treat malignant and non-malignant disease. The award is unusual in how the money is split: €500,000 goes to the winner personally, and €2 million is earmarked to fund the winner’s future research. That structure makes it both a career honor and a substantial working grant.

This is a nomination-based prize, not an open application, so the practical work of “applying” happens through a sponsoring institution. If you are a scientist in this field, your route in is to be nominated by the head of your institute, department, or a professional organization. If you lead a research institution or a scientific society, you are the person who can put a candidate forward. The nomination deadline is 27 August 2026, and the winner will be honored at a ceremony in Bad Homburg, Germany, on 3 June 2027.

Key Details at a Glance

What the Prize Offers

The €2.5 million total is the headline, but the way it is divided is what makes the prize distinctive. The €500,000 personal component is an unrestricted recognition of the recipient’s contribution — a scientist can use it as they see fit. The €2 million research component is dedicated to funding the winner’s future work, which effectively hands a leading researcher a large, flexible pool of capital to pursue the next phase of their program without the usual constraints of project-specific grant cycles.

For a field like cell-based immunotherapy, where costs for reagents, viral vectors, GMP manufacturing, animal models, and clinical translation run high, €2 million of committed research funding can move a program forward by years. Just as important is the visibility. The Else Kröner Fresenius Prize is one of the highest-value medical research awards in Europe, and being named as its recipient carries reputational weight that helps with recruiting collaborators, attracting talented trainees, and unlocking additional funding.

The award ceremony in Bad Homburg — the town near Frankfurt where the foundation is based — brings together the German and international biomedical community, and the recognition typically generates coverage across scientific and specialist press.

The 2027 Focus: Cell-Based Immunotherapies

Each cycle of the prize is dedicated to a specific field, and for 2027 the theme is cell-based immunotherapies. The foundation defines this broadly to include approaches that involve the ex vivo and in vivo engineering of immune cells for therapies addressing both malignant diseases (such as cancers) and non-malignant conditions (such as autoimmune, infectious, or degenerative disease).

In practice, this covers a wide swath of contemporary immunology and translational medicine, including but not limited to:

• CAR (chimeric antigen receptor) T-cell and CAR-NK approaches
• T-cell receptor (TCR) engineered therapies
• In vivo cell engineering, including lipid-nanoparticle or vector-delivered reprogramming of immune cells inside the patient
• Regulatory T-cell (Treg) therapies for autoimmunity and transplantation
• Macrophage, NK, and other innate immune cell therapies
• Enabling platform work — gene editing, delivery, manufacturing, and safety switches — that makes engineered cell therapies more effective, safer, or more accessible

Because the theme is defined by the field rather than a narrow sub-question, the strongest candidates are typically researchers whose body of work has shaped how the field thinks or has produced a therapy, platform, or concept that others now build on. The prize rewards a track record of outstanding contribution, not a single paper.

Who Should Be Nominated

Eligibility is deliberately open on nationality and geography: candidates may be of any nationality and work in any country. What matters is the scientific contribution and the fit with the 2027 theme. Candidates must be academic researchers in the basic or clinical medical sciences who have made outstanding contributions to cell-based immunotherapies.

One point that nominators should weigh carefully: the foundation states that it favors nominations of younger and mid-career scientists. This is not a lifetime-achievement prize aimed only at the most senior figures in a field. If anything, the foundation is signaling that it wants to recognize researchers who are still in the productive, forward-looking part of their careers — people for whom €2 million in research funding will shape the next decade of their work rather than cap a career. Nominators sitting on a choice between an established elder statesperson and a rising mid-career leader should read that preference as real guidance.

Good candidates tend to share a few traits: a clearly identifiable contribution that changed practice or understanding in cell-based immunotherapy; a set of milestone publications that reviewers outside the immediate subfield can recognize; and a credible, ambitious plan for what the research funding would enable next.

How the Nomination Process Works

This is a nomination-only prize — candidates cannot put themselves forward. Nominations must come from heads of research institutes or professional organizations. If you are a scientist who fits the theme, the practical step is to speak with your institute director, department chair, or the leadership of a relevant scientific society and make the case that you (or a colleague) should be nominated, well before the August deadline.

Nominations are submitted through the foundation’s online portal at https://application.ekfs.de/. The required materials are concise and specific:

1. Complete contact details for both the candidate and the nominator.
2. A short statement explaining the nomination — a maximum of 400 characters, so essentially a one- or two-sentence encapsulation of why this candidate deserves the prize.
3. A nomination letter of no more than two pages.
4. The ten most important publications of the candidate, with milestone papers clearly highlighted.
5. A brief CV of two to three pages.

The tight length limits reward clarity. A two-page nomination letter is not the place for a full literature review; it should make an unmistakable argument about the candidate’s central contribution, its impact on the field, and why it fits the 2027 theme of cell-based immunotherapies.

Timeline and What Happens After Submission

The selection process runs over roughly ten months from deadline to ceremony:

• 27 August 2026 — nomination deadline.
• September 2026 — the jury selects a shortlist from the submitted nominations.
• Through December 2026 — external experts conduct a detailed review of the shortlisted candidates and their bodies of work.
• January 2027 — the jury nominates the winner and the Foundation Board confirms the decision.
• 3 June 2027 — the award ceremony takes place in Bad Homburg v.d.H., Germany.

Because external expert review is a core part of the process, the quality and legibility of the nomination materials matter well beyond the shortlist stage. Reviewers who may not work in the exact same niche will lean heavily on the highlighted milestone publications and the nominator’s framing to assess impact.

Preparation Strategy for Nominators

If you are preparing a nomination, treat it as you would a high-stakes grant or award submission:

• Start early. Coordinating a nomination letter, curating the ten key publications, and preparing a tight CV takes time, especially if the nominator is an institute head balancing many demands. Beginning in early summer 2026 leaves room to refine.
• Lead with the contribution, not the biography. The 400-character statement and the two-page letter should make the single most important scientific contribution obvious in the first lines.
• Curate the ten publications deliberately. Do not simply list the most-cited papers. Choose the ones that best demonstrate a milestone in cell-based immunotherapy and explain, in the letter, why each matters.
• Speak to the theme explicitly. Reviewers are assessing fit with cell-based immunotherapies. Draw the line clearly between the candidate’s work and that field.
• Honor the mid-career preference. If the candidate is younger or mid-career, frame the future — what the €2 million would unlock — as a strength.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Assuming you can self-nominate. You cannot. The nomination must come from an institute or organization head. Waiting too long to secure that sponsor is the most avoidable failure.
• Missing the length limits. Overlong letters or a publication list that is not clearly prioritized weaken an otherwise strong case.
• Treating it as a lifetime award. Given the stated preference for younger and mid-career scientists, an overly retrospective nomination can miss the mark.
• Ignoring the theme boundary. Excellent immunology that is not clearly cell-based immunotherapy is a poor fit for this particular cycle.
• Leaving submission to the last day. Portal-based submissions with multiple document requirements are best completed with margin before 27 August 2026.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much is the prize actually worth to me? €2.5 million in total — €500,000 paid to the recipient personally and €2 million dedicated to the recipient’s future research.

Can I apply myself? No. Self-nomination is not permitted. You must be nominated by the head of a research institute or a professional organization.

Do I need to be based in Germany or Europe? No. Candidates may be of any nationality and work in any country.

Does the prize favor senior scientists? The foundation states that it favors nominations of younger and mid-career scientists, so it is not aimed solely at the most senior figures.

What is the 2027 theme? Cell-based immunotherapies, including ex vivo and in vivo engineering of immune cells for malignant and non-malignant diseases.

When and where is the award given? At a ceremony on 3 June 2027 in Bad Homburg v.d.H., Germany.

Official Links and Next Steps

The authoritative source for the 2027 prize, including any updates to the process, is the foundation’s page: https://ekfs.de/en/scientific-funding/international-research-prize/ekfpm2027. Nominations are submitted through the portal at https://application.ekfs.de/. For questions, the Else Kröner-Fresenius-Stiftung can be reached at Rathausplatz 3-7, 61348 Bad Homburg v.d.H., Germany; phone +49 6172 8975-0; email [email protected].

If you believe you or a colleague is a strong candidate, the single most important next step is to identify and brief a qualified nominator — an institute or organization head — and to begin assembling the nomination letter, the curated list of ten key publications, and a concise CV well ahead of the 27 August 2026 deadline. All figures, dates, and requirements above are drawn from the foundation’s official 2027 prize page; confirm any detail directly with the foundation before submitting.