Bruker Prize Lecture 2026
Since 1986 Bruker BioSpin has generously sponsored an annual lectureship and prize, given to a scientist who has made a major contribution to the application of ESR spectroscopy in chemical or biological systems. The RSC ESR Interest Group committee is pleased to announce that the Bruker Prize for 2026 is awarded to Professor Christiane Timmel (University of Oxford, UK)
for her outstanding and influential work studying the effect of magnetic fields on photoinduced electron transfer reactions, in particular the radical pair mechanism proposed to underlie avian magnetoreception. Prof. Timmel has pioneered combinations of optical and magnetic resonance spectroscopies to probe magnetosensitive reaction kinetics in biological systems and synthetic molecular models. She has also made significant contributions to understanding spin polarization and spin delocalization in supramolecular structures for molecular electronics. Her comprehensive approach, seamlessly integrating experimental techniques with theoretical insights, along with her commitment to fostering teamwork and interdisciplinary collaboration, has led to significant advancements in the fundamental understanding of spin dynamics in chemical and biological systems. In addition to her scientific excellence, she has advanced the fields of ESR and spin chemistry both nationally and internationally through impactful mentorship and inspiring leadership.
The 2026 Bruker lecture is the 41st Anniversary of this prestigious prize, and we are excited to celebrate this milestone and Christiane’s achievement at our Colchester conference in Spring 2026. The list of winners of the previous 40 Bruker Prizes is available here. We are grateful to Bruker for their longstanding support of this prize.
Bruker Thesis Prize 2026
The ESR Group of the Royal Society of Chemistry and Bruker Corporation are pleased to announce the winner of the 12th Bruker ESR Thesis Prize is Dr Annemarie Kehl. As winner of the 2026 competition, Dr Kehl has accepted an invitation to give a prize lecture at the 59th Annual International Meeting of the RSC ESR spectroscopy group, in Essex, 13th – 16th June 2026.
Dr Annemarie Kehl completed her doctoral thesis, titled “Development of Analysis- and Simulation-Routines for ENDOR Spectroscopy”, at the Max Planck Institute for Multidisciplinary Sciences, Göttingen, under the supervision of Prof. Marina Bennati. Our international judging panel were impressed with the importance contribution her PhD thesis contributes towards the quantitative understanding of 19F hyperfine spectroscopy noting:
Lecture courses will have to be changed as a result of this research. The new simulation package for use with high resolution (and high field) ENDOR was employed in the very challenging problem of determining distance distributions in a biological sample. Essentially any research in future into “high resolution, high field” ENDOR would have this thesis and the publications that flow from it as required reading.
We look forward to hearing about this work in the thesis prize lecture which will take place during the conference at an award evening.
We are grateful to Bruker for their continued support of this prize, now in its 12th year. The prize is awarded annually, and now has an entry deadline of 1st October each year. For further details of the prize and a list of past winners please see our thesis prize page, where details of the next entry round will also be posted. Please join our mail list if you would like to be notified when applications are opened for the next Bruker Thesis Prize.