Three Women Named Laureates of the Blavatnik National Awards for Young Scientists

Each year, the Blavatnik Family Foundation and the New York Academy of Sciences present the Blavatnik National Awards for Young Scientists to the three most promising, faculty-level researchers under the age of 42 who are in the fields of life sciences, chemical sciences, and physical sciences and engineering. Out of 331 nominations and 18 finalists, all three awards were presented to women scholars at American universities.

Cigall Kadoch, associate professor of pediatric oncology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School, has been named the 2024 Laureate in Life Sciences. She was recognized for her work in discovering and characterizing chromatin remodeling complexes in an effort to understand how their disruption leads to human disease and how to develop new therapeutics.

In 2014, at the age of 28, Dr. Kadoch became one of the youngest scientists ever appointed to the Harvard Medical School faculty. In addition to her primary appointment, she holds a faculty affiliation with Harvard’s department of biological chemistry and molecular biology. She is also a member and co-director of the epigenomics program for the Broad Institute, a collaboration between Harvard and MIT.

Dr. Kadoch is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, where she majored in molecular and cellular biology. She received her Ph.D. in cancer biology from the Stanford University School of Medicine.

Markita del Carpio Landry, associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, has been named the 2024 Laureate in Chemical Sciences. She was honored for developing pioneering nanoscale chemical tools that can address disparate challenges in human health and sustainability. Her work contributes to a wide range of disciplines and tasks, such as measuring brain chemicals and bioengineering plant genetics.

At UC Berkeley, Dr. Landry holds an appointment in the department of neuroscience. She also serves as a faculty scientist with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Before taking on her current position, she was a postdoctoral fellow in MIT’s department of chemical engineering.

Dr. Landry recevied dual bachelor’s degrees in chemistry and physics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She holds a Ph.D. in chemical physics from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

Britney E. Schmidt, associate professor of astronomy at Cornell University, has been named the 2024 Laureate in Physical Sciences and Engineering. She was recognized for making significant advances in climate science and planetary habitability studies through her research on ice-ocean interactions and her exploration of Earth’s polar regions.

Since 2021, Dr. Schmidt has taught in Cornell’s department of astronomy and department of earth and atmospheric sciences. She holds affiliations with the Carl Sagan Institute and Cornell’s Center for Astrophysics and Planetary Science. Prior to her current role, she taught at the Georgia Institute of Technology for eight years.

Dr. Schmidt is a graduate of the University of Arizona, where she majored in physics. She holds a master’s degree and Ph.D. in geophysics and space physics from the University of California, Los Angeles.