Serendipity Award

This award is bestowed annually upon either two individual young researchers or two groups of young researchers recognized for either making serendipitous discoveries or developing technologies that facilitate serendipity. The selection of awardees is based on an evaluation of publications by Serendipity Lab members within the relevant year, conducted by the directors. The recipients are announced, and the awards are presented during the Serendipity Symposium, an annual event. Each award includes a certificate and a $200 prize.



Awardees of 2023


Serendipity Award 2023 is given to the first authors of two serendipitous papers published in 2023: Shreya Udani et al., "Associating growth factor secretions and transcriptomes of single cells in nanovials using SEC-seq", Nature Nanotechnology 19, 354 (2023); Sho Sekiya et al., "Drosophila screening identifies dual inhibition of MEK and AURKB as an effective therapy for pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma", Cancer Research 83, 2704 (2023).

Shreya Udani

Graduate Student
UCLA
USA

Sho Sekiya

Graduate Student
Hokkaido Univ.
Japan

Awardees of 2022


Serendipity Award 2022 is given to the first authors of two serendipitous papers published in 2022: Yunjie Deng et al., "Understanding stenosis-induced platelet aggregation on a chip by high-speed optical imaging", Sensors and Actuators B: Chemical 356, 131318 (2022); Tianlong Zhang et al., "Shape-based separation of drug-treated Escherichia coli using viscoelastic microfluidics", Lab on a Chip 22, 2801 (2022).

Yunjie Deng

Graduate Student
Univ. of Tokyo
Japan

Tianlong Zhang

Graduate Student
NAIST
Japan

Awardees of 2021


Serendipity Award 2021 is given to the first authors of two serendipitous papers published in 2021: Pan Cheng et al., "Direct control of store-operated calcium channels by ultrafast laser", Cell Research 31, 758 (2021); Masako Nishikawa*, Hiroshi Kanno*, Yuqi Zhou* et al., "Massive image-based single-cell profiling reveals high levels of circulating platelet aggregates in patients with COVID-19", Nature Communications 12, 7135 (2021); * = co-first authors.

Pan Cheng

Graduate Student
New York Univ.
USA

Masako Nishikawa

Assistant Professor
Univ. of Tokyo Hospital
Japan

Hiroshi Kanno

Graduate Student
Univ. of Tokyo
Japan

Yuqi Zhou

Graduate Student
Univ. of Tokyo
Japan