The world's leading teams researching into the human genome have been granted the Award. The teams are from The Sanger Centre in the United Kingdom, directed by John Sulston, from the National Human Genome Research Institute, under the leadership of Francis Collins, from Celera Genomics (U.S.A.) led by Craig Venter and Hamilton Smith and from Genoscope in France, under the directorship of Jean Weissenbach.

The complete mapping of the Genome is one of the most ambitious projects in the history of Science. Its conclusion will usher in a new era in the treatment of illnesses. Spectacular breakthroughs in the complete molecular and physiological analysis of genes and their interactions will bring genetic predisposition to suffering illnesses to light, thereby leading to better prevention policies to combat them.

Hamilton Smith was awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1978. He was born in New York in 1931. He studied Medicine at the universities of Illinois, California and John Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore. He has been director of the DNA research department at Celera Genomics Corporation since 1998, and has thus had a fundamental influence on the discovery and publicising of the human genome map. He is a member of the U.S.A.'s National Academy of Sciences, of the American Microbiology Society, and of the Society of Biological Chemists.