Recipients of the awards, according to the White House website, are Americans who have strengthened the well-being of the nation through their “exemplary achievements in science, technology, and innovation.”
The website further elaborates that both the National Medal of Science and the National Medal of Technology and Innovation awards are the nation’s highest honors in those categories, and the individuals who receive them have made “outstanding contributions in biology, computer sciences, education sciences, engineering, geo-science, mathematical and physical sciences, and social, behavioral, and economic sciences, in service to the nation.”
FILE - U.S. President Joe Biden awards the National Medal of Science and the National Medal of Technology and Innovation at the White House in Washington.
Among the award recipients was Gebisa Ejeta, distinguished professor of Plant Breeding & Genetics and also executive director of the Purdue Center for Global Food Security at Purdue University.
Ejeta was born and raised in west-central Ethiopia, where he studied received his bachelors of science in Plant Sciences before attending Purdue University where he earned his master’s degree and Ph.D in Plant Breeding and Genetics, according to the institution's website.
Ejeta is also the 2009 recipient of the World Food Prize for developing drought and striga weed resistant sorghum hybrids, as well as increasing food supply for millions in sub-Saharan Africa, according to the World Food Prize website.
The full list of recipients listed on the White House website are as follows:
Recipients of the National Medal of Science
Huda Akil, University of Michigan
Barry C. Barish, California Institute of Technology
Gebisa Ejeta, Purdue University
Eve E. Marder, Brandeis University
Gregory A. Petsko, Harvard Medical School, Brigham & Women’s Hospital
Myriam Sarachik, (posthumously) The City College of New York
Subra Suresh, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Brown University
Shelley E. Taylor, University of California, Los Angeles
Sheldon Weinbaum, The City College of New York
Recipients of the National Medal of Technology and Innovation
Mary-Dell Chilton, Syngenta Biotechnology, Inc.
John M. Cioffi, Stanford University, ASSIA, Inc.
Rory A. Cooper, University of Pittsburgh, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
Ashok Gadgil, University of California, Berkeley, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Juan E. Gilbert, University of Florida
Charles W. Hull, 3D Systems
Jeong H. Kim, Kiswe Mobile, Inc.
Steven A. Rosenberg, National Cancer Institute
Neil Gilbert Siegel, University of Southern California
James G. Fujimoto and Eric Swanson, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and David Huang, Oregon Health & Science University (team)