Call for Nominations
ABOUT THE PRIZE
The Pasteur Vallery-Radot Prizewas established in 2007 by Jacqueline Pasteur Vallery-Radot; wife of the grandson of Louis Pasteur. She designated the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF) as her universal legatee, with the mission of awarding this prize annually using the capital generated by her legacy.
The Pasteur Vallery-Radot Prize is awarded to two researchers of the Institut Pasteur (under 50 years of age during the year of the call (i.e. born in 1977 or later), for research results of major impact in biology, physics, or chemistry obtained during the last 5 years.
Prize money: Two prizes of 16 000€ each (awarded to the laureates).
NOMINATOR ELIGIBILITY
- Heads of entities, emeritus and honorary professors working at the Institut Pasteur are eligible to nominate a candidate.
- Nominations from nominators who collaborates or have collaborated with the nominee within the last five years are not accepted.
- Members of the Institut Pasteur Scientific Council and of the Institut Pasteur Direction are not eligible to nominate a candidate; however members of their laboratories may be nominated.
- Each Nominator may submit only one nomination per award.
NOMINEE ELIGIBILITY
- Self-nomination is not allowed.
- Eligible nominees must have worked at the Institut Pasteur for a minimum of five years and must hold, at the time of application, a permanent position either at the Institut Pasteur or as OREX (CNRS, Inserm, INRA, etc.).
- Eligible nominee must be under 50 years of age in the year of the call. For the 2026 call, this corresponds to candidates born in 1977 or later. An extension of the age limit of up to two years may be granted in the event of documented career interruptions, such as maternity or parental leave, extended sick leave, or equivalent circumstances.
- Awardees are not eligible for another Institut Pasteur award for a period of five years following the last award obtained (see below for the list of laureates of the last five years). For the 2026 call, laureates who obtained an Institut Pasteur prize in 2020 or later are not eligible
SELECTION PROCESS
- The Institut Pasteur Scientific Council will select the two laureates of the Vallery-Radot Prize at its annual meeting in March 2026. Members of the Institut Pasteur Scientific Council are listed at this address: https://www.pasteur.fr/fr/institut-pasteur/conseil-scientifique
- The selection is subject to approval by the President of the Institut Pasteur.
- As part of the award, the laureates commit to serving on the jury responsible for selecting the laureates of other Institut Pasteur Prizes (Canetti, Ullmann and IPYSA). The laureates will be invited to participate in the jury meeting (approximately two hours) scheduled for September 2026.
SUBMITTING A NOMINATION
The complete nomination file (click) should be sent as a single pdf file to hafida.fsihi@pasteur.fr no later than February 13, 2026 (6 PM).
Nomination files remain eligible for two years and may be updated provided that (i) the nominator still agrees with the nomination and (ii) the nominee remains eligible for the Prize.
ARE NOT ELIGIBLE TO APPLY
Past laureates of the Vallery-Radot prize:
Molly Ingersoll & Pablo Navarro-Gil (2025), Rayan Chikhi & Darragh Duffy (2024) ; Ludovic Deriano & Romain Levayer (2023) ; Germano Cecere & Francesca Dinunzio (2022) ; Jérôme Gros & Etienne Patin (2021); Pierre Bruhns & Louis Lambrechts (2020).
Laureates of Institut Pasteur prize from the last five years
-Zermati Prize* (2020-2025) : Christophe Beloin & Micheline Fromont-Racine (2022); Rachel Golub (2020).(*The Zermati Prize is not any more available)
-Duquesne Prize (2020-2025): Carmen Buchrieser (2025), Artur Scherf (2024), Thomas Bourgeron (2023); Olivier Schwartz (2022); Sylvie van der Werf (2021); Shahragim Tajbakhsh (2020)
-Canetti Prize (2020-2025): Céline Loot (2025); Mathieu Picardeau (2024) ; Sylvain Brisse (2023) ; Olaya Rendules (2022) ; Etienne Simon-Lorière (2021); Mélanie Hamon (2020).
-Agnes Ullmann.Prize (since 2023): Sarah Merkling &Nicola Festuccia (2025); Zeynep Baharoglu & Thomas Rolland, (2024) Marija Backovic & Ludovic Sauguet (2023)
-Lebrasseur Prize (2019-2024: Marcel Hollenstein (2024); Frédéric Barras (2023); Mart Krupovic (2021); Didier Ménard (2020).The Lebrasseur Prize will not be launched in 2026