Coins DIG

The inventor who came up with the idea of creating a DNA fingerprinting will lead the shortlist for the very important Millennium Technology Prize.

Both, Professor Alec Jeffreys and Professor David Payne, who was the co-inventor of an optical amplifier, a device that revolutionized telecommunications, are on the list. Among other finalists there are the co-inventors of Professor Payne, Prof Emmanual Desurvire and Dr. Randy Giles.

The other contenders include Dr. Andrew Viterbi, who developed an algorithm that is of much help in the field of communications, and Professor Robert Langer, a biomaterial pioneer.

It is worth mentioning that the Millennium Technology Prize is a sort of informal Nobel Prize given to researchers activating in the field of technology. The Millennium Technology Prize is one of the most prestigious awards given for innovation. The award is granted every second year and the winners are highly appreciated for developing technology that "significantly improves the quality of human life, today and in the future."

The award is given away by the Technology Academy Finland, which is an independent foundation set up by the Finnish industry, in collaboration with the Finish government.

The winning scientist gets 800,000 euros and the developers of other useful innovations are awarded with 115,000 euros each.

Earlier winners include Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who developed the World Wide Web and Professor Shuji Nakamura, who invented the blue, green and white light-emitting diodes (LEDs) as well as the blue laser diode.

Commenting on the inclusion in the list of innovators for Millennium Technology Prize, Sir Alec, from the University of Leicester, UK, mentioned that it is a great honor "a great recognition for DNA technology and the way it has progressed over the last 24 years. If nothing else, DNA has captured the public's imagination; it's out there every single day in papers and on the television; and the technology has reached out and touched the lives of 20 million people."

Sir Alec added: "Every single time this has happened it's a drama for that person, in terms of a DNA test; whether it's a father learning about his son, an immigrant family being reunited or an innocent man being saved off death row."

The innovation of Sir Alec has been characterized as a "Eureka" moment, when the scientist looked at DNA X-ray experiment he has been working on back in 1984 and observed both likeness and distinction in his technician's family DNA.

Sir Alec stated that the only ones who hate this honor are "criminals who were being caught thanks to DNA fingerprinting".

Currently he focuses on reducing the amount of time between taking the DNA test and receiving its result.

"It can be as quick as a few hours, but we want to get it down to a second, to real time. Imagine the security possibilities if we could establish identity that quickly," he outlined.

Professor Robert Langer, working at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is the founder of biomaterials. He has been included in the list "for his inventions and development of innovative biomaterials for controlled drug release and tissue regeneration that have saved and improved the lives of millions of people".

Andrew Viterbi, an Italian-American engineer, has also been included in the list for the development of an algorithm that is able to make billions of phone calls each day on mobile networks.

According to the Academy, the algorithm of Viterbi represents "the key building element in modern wireless and digital communications systems, touching lives of people everywhere".

For their contribution in the creation of technology that made it possible the development of a high-speed global fibre-optic network, the Academy shortlisted three scientists. Together with his colleagues at Southampton University, Professor David Payne in the mid-1980s was in competition with two scientists at Bell Labs, who were Dr. Emmanuel Desurvire and Dr. Randy Giles. They competed for the creation of an optical amplifier able to solve the lack of fibre optic cables of the day.

Both teams were able to create an optical amplifier, named erbium-doped fibre amplifier. The invention was power efficient and allowed light to travel through cables without the need of being converted into an electrical signal and afterwards reset with a new laser.

Professor Payne was the one to publish a paper on erbium-doped fibre amplifiers. Both Dr. Desurvire, currently working at Thales Research, and Dr. Giles, who is now the director of optical subsystems at Bell Labs, were those who made it working tool.

Professor Payne outlined that fibre to the home was important if Britain had the goal of competing with broadband take-up worldwide.

"Sadly broadband speeds in this country aren't really broadband at all. I won't be happy until every home has a one gigabit per second connection," mentioned Payne.

He stated that: "If we were able to afford to dig up the road in the 1980s to roll out cable TV then we can afford to do it again."

The Millennium Technology Prize winner will be announced on 11 June.