Science Prizes for the 21st Century - The Kavli Prizes recognize scientists for their seminal advances in three research areas: astrophysics, nanoscience and neuroscience.

Inaugurated in 2008, the Kavli Prizes are jointly sponsored and awarded by the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters, the Norwegian Ministry of Education and Research, and The Kavli Foundation. The prizes are awarded at a ceremony in Oslo, Norway, followed by a symposium honoring the laureates.

The Kavli Prizes are administered by the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters. The Norwegian Academy organizes Prize selection committees comprised of distinguished international scientists recommended by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the French Academy of Sciences, the Max Planck Society, the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and The Royal Society of the U.K. After completing their reviews, the review committees' selections are put forward to the Academy for confirmation. The review process and the selection of Kavli Prize recipients are independent of The Kavli Foundation and the Kavli Institutes. Cosmology is the study of the Universe as a whole and its history since the beginning. Our understanding of this history is undergoing a revolution with fields as diverse as high energy physics and astronomy converging in both theory and experiment. Further, cosmological discoveries over the past two decades have and a profound impact on both astronomy and Physics.

The Kavli Prize in Astrophysics will be awarded for outstanding achievement in advancing our knowledge and understanding of the origin, evolution, and properties of the universe, including the fields of cosmology, astrophysics, astronomy, planetary science, solar physics, space science, astrobiology, astronomical and astrophysical instrumentation, and particle astrophysics.

The Kavli Prizes were awarded for the first time in Oslo on 9 September, 2008. His Royal Highness Crown Prince Haakon Magnus led the presentation of the international research prizes to seven of the world's most prominent scientists in astrophysics, nanoscience and neuroscience. The prize award in each of the scientific areas carries a cash award of 1 million American dollars, donated by Fred Kavli. Each of of laureates also received a gold medal and a scroll.

Fred Kavli addresses the audience at the Kavli Prize Award Ceremony in Oslo, Norway. (Photo: The Norwegian Academy of Science & Letters/Hakon Mosvold Larsen/Scanpix)

The 2008 Kavli Prize in Astrophysics was awarded jointly to Maarten Schmidt, of the California Institute of Technology, US, and Donald Lynden-Bell, of Cambridge University, UK, both of whose work underpins our understanding of quasars.

Maarten Schmidt and Donald Lynden-Bell receive the first Kavli Prize in astrophysics from Crown Prince Haakon. (Photo: Hakon Mosvold Larsen/Scanpix)

In 1963, Maarten Schmidt unlocked the gate to the far reaches of the Universe by correctly identifying emission lines in the optical spectrum of a radio "star" known as 3C273. That insight immediately showed that 3C273 is an extremely luminous, very distant object rather than a star in our own Galaxy. Objects like 3C273 are now known as quasars. Schmidt's breakthrough interpretation of the spectrum of 3C273 followed essential work by radio astronomers, who discovered quasars by their radio wave emission and measured their positions on the sky.

Schmidt extended his discovery by finding quasars even more distant than 3C273 and showing that quasars were much more numerous when the Universe was young. Schmidt also devised powerful statistical techniques to measure the luminosity and space density evolution of quasars.

The extraordinary power emitted by quasars requires an extraordinary engine. Various proposals for the nature of the quasar engine were advanced in the years following Schmidt's discovery. The watershed in our theoretical understanding of the nature of quasars was Donald Lynden-Bell's investigation in 1969 of the hypothesis that quasars were powered by gravity, through the accretion of material onto massive black holes.

Although others had suggested that quasars were powered by black hole accretion, Lynden-Bell argued persuasively that most of their luminosity comes from frictional heating in a rotating gaseous disk (the "accretion disk"); developed an approximate model for their spectrum; and suggested that these black holes are to be found in the centers of galaxies. He also pointed out that many nearby galaxies should contain black holes at their centers that do not currently shine ("dead quasars") and that these could be detected by their gravitational influence on stars orbiting nearby, a prediction that has been observationally confirmed.

Maarten Schmidt's and Donald Lynden-Bell's seminal work dramatically expanded the scale of the observable Universe and led to our present view of a violent Universe in which massive black holes play a key role.

The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters has posted the nomination period for the 2010 Kavli Prize. The call for nominations will be open September 1 - December 15, 2009. For additional information about the call for nominations and application process, please visit www.kavliprize.no. To request notification on the call for nominations and other updates, submit your request to: kavliprize@dnva.no.