Luca Jovine to receive the Fernström Prize for research on conception

This year's Eric K. Fernström Prize is to be awarded to Dr Luca Jovine of the Department of Bioscience and Nutrition, Karolinska Institutet, for his research on conception and the interaction between sperm and egg at a molecular level.

Dr Jovine is to receive the prize for revealing the molecular process of fertilisation and for describing the three-dimensional structure of a sperm receptor protein on the surface of the egg. His insights into these fertilisation mechanisms have helped medical science understand the causes of infertility and will be important for the development of new contraceptives.

"We now have to look at the corresponding proteins on the sperm and understand how these molecules bind to those on the surface of the ovum," says Dr Jovine.

The Eric K. Fernström Prize is awarded to particularly promising and successful junior researchers under the age of 45. It will be awarded at a ceremony at Lund University to coincide with Science Day on 2 November and given special mention at Karolinska Institutet's installation ceremony on 8 November in the Berwald Hall.