This prize is
Germany's most renowned medical award and is endowed with € 120,000. It is traditionally awarded on March 14, Paul Ehrlich's birthday, in Frankfurt's Paulskirche, a renowned symbol of Germany's democracy.
The prize
honours scientists who have made special contributions in areas of research represented by Paul Ehrlich's achievements, namely in
immunology, cancer research, haematology, microbiology and chemotherapy.
Awarded since 1952, the prize is funded by the Federal Ministry of Health, the German Association of Research-based Pharmaceutical Companies (Verband Forschender Arzneimittelhersteller e.V.) and by earmarked donations from the following companies, foundations and institutions: Else Kröner-Fresenius-Foundation, Sanofi-Aventis Deutschland GmbH, C.H. Boehringer Sohn AG & Co. KG, Biotest AG, Hans und Wolfgang Schleussner-Foundation, Fresenius SE & Co. KGaA, F. Hoffmann-LaRoche Ltd., Grünenthal Group, Janssen-Cilag GmbH, Merck KGaA, Bayer AG, Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH & Co.KG, GlaxoSmithKline GmbH & Co. KG, B. Metzler seel. Sohn & Co KGaA.
The award winners are selected by the
Scientific Council of the Paul Ehrlich Foundation.
To date, 128 scientists have received the prize. Of these, 26 prize winners are also Nobel Prize laureates
(list of Nobel Prize Winners) (status as of 2023).
History of the prize
The prize has two roots in the German Weimar Republic. The Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize was established in 1926 by the board of the Georg-Speyer-Haus Foundation on the occasion of the 80th birthday of its namesake. From then on, it was awarded every three years for outstanding work in the fields of chemotherapy and biology, even through the years of Nazi dictatorship. However, from 1935 this was without public announcement and only communicated to employees of the Paul Ehrlich Institutes based in Frankfurt. The Paul Ehrlich Prize, donated by Ehrlich's widow Hedwig in 1929, could only be awarded from 1930 to 1934. It then fell victim to German anti-Semitism.
After the war, it was decided in April 1952 to merge the Paul Ehrlich Prize and the Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize.
