Talent and the Future: IBSA Foundation for Scientific Research Honours 2025 Fellowship Winners in Barcelona

Providing concrete support for the researchers of tomorrow – that is the goal of the IBSA Foundation Fellowships. Now in their 13th edition, these prestigious grants – worth €32,000 each – have been awarded to six researchers under the age of 40, drawn from universities and research centres across the globe.

The fellowships span five scientific areas that are frequently underfunded: dermatology, endocrinology, fertility/urology, orthopaedics/pain medicine/rheumatology, and healthy ageing and regenerative medicine.

From 2025, the IBSA Foundation Research Equity Prize has also been established – a €5,000 award recognising the best scientific project developed at a research institution based in a developing country.

THE AWARD CEREMONY

The 2025 winners were honoured during a roundtable event entitled "IBSA Foundation Fellowship: Empowering Young Talent, Inspiring Tomorrow's Science", held in Barcelona at the Royal Academy of Medicine de Cataluña.

Barcelona was no coincidence. The city was chosen as a tribute to the historic, consistent and high-quality contribution that Spain and its researchers have made to the programme. In recent years, Spanish applicants have represented between 9% and 20% of all submissions received – a commitment that also translates into tangible results: Spanish researchers account for nearly 12.5% of all winners in the programme's history.

THE 2025 WINNERS

In a record-breaking edition for both project volume and international engagement, the Fellowship recipients are:

• Matthew Hunt – Karolinska Institutet, Solna (Sweden) | Therapeutic area: Dermatology
• Patricia Rada – Consorcio Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red (CIBER), Instituto de Investigaciones Biomédicas Sols Morreale, Madrid (Spain) | Therapeutic area: Endocrinology
• Victoria Deneke – Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP), Vienna (Austria) | Therapeutic area: Fertility/Urology
• Youngjun Kim – University of Bern (Switzerland) | Therapeutic area: Orthopaedics/pain medicine/rheumatology
• Indranil Singh – Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge (USA) | Therapeutic area: Healthy ageing and Regenerative medicine
• Silvia Sideri – Sapienza University of Rome (Italy) | Therapeutic area: Healthy ageing and Regenerative medicine

The IBSA Foundation Research Equity Prize was awarded to Hernán Andrés Morales-Navarrete, Universidad de Las Américas, Quito (Ecuador).

A MISSION FOR THE FUTURE OF SCIENCE

Supporting the education and training of young researchers is a cornerstone of IBSA Foundation's mission. "Since 2013, we have invested over €1.8 million to support 65 projects," said Silvia Misiti, Director of IBSA Foundation for Scientific Research. "We are not merely funding individual careers – we are investing in the collective future of knowledge and human wellbeing. This commitment is also reflected in our new Research Equity Prize, designed to support research in developing countries."

Alessandro Ruggiero, Secretary General of IBSA Group, echoed this vision: "As a pharmaceutical company, we place innovation at the heart of everything we do. But we know full well that true discoveries do not happen overnight. We believe that giving brilliant young minds the opportunity to dedicate themselves to fundamental research is the only way to build the path of discovery that will lead to the applications and therapies of the future."

TRENDS FROM A RECORD-BREAKING EDITION

The IBSA Foundation Fellowships reached a new milestone this year, receiving 398 applications from 64 countries – a reflection of the growing global belief in the power of young talent in research.

The 2025 edition stands out not only for its figures, but also for several significant trends. Most notably, the healthy ageing/regenerative medicine category – introduced only in 2022 – attracted 136 proposals this year, representing over a third of the total, cementing its status as a primary area of scientific interest.

Equally striking is the data on female participation: nearly 60% of applications were submitted by women researchers – a figure that underscores the growing role of women in STEM disciplines and aligns with the Foundation's commitment to fostering an increasingly inclusive research environment.

RESEARCH ACCELERATES: SEVEN FELLOWSHIPS FOR 2026

Building on the success of this edition, IBSA Foundation looks ahead and announces the opening of the Fellowship call for 2026. For the next edition, the Foundation is strengthening its commitment by increasing the number of grants to seven, each worth €32,000.

Researchers under 40 will have until 31 January 2027 to submit their projects via the dedicated platform – a genuine opportunity to turn their ideas into tomorrow's progress.