Indian-born scientist Shankar Balasubramanian has been awarded the 2026 Wolf Prize in Chemistry alongside British chemist David Klenerman and French biophysicist Pascal Mayer. The trio was recognised for developing low-cost, large-scale DNA sequencing methods for genomic medicine.
Balasubramanian and Klenerman pioneered a massively parallel sequencing approach that allowed millions of DNA fragments to be read simultaneously. Mayer contributed technology that helped turn the research into a practical high-throughput sequencing system.
Their work helped establish next-generation sequencing as a widely used technology. It increased the speed of genome sequencing while substantially reducing its cost. The resulting technology has been used in medical research and genomic applications.
The three scientists also received the 2026 Princess of Asturias Award for Technical and Scientific Research. That award recognised their role in developing sequencing technologies that have been applied to clinical diagnosis and research in biology, biomedicine, ecology and forensic medicine.
Balasubramanian was born in Madras, now Chennai, in 1966 and moved to Britain as a child. He is a professor at the University of Cambridge and has worked extensively on DNA sequencing and molecular biology.
The Wolf Foundation said the sequencing platform that emerged from the researchers’ work forms the technological basis for more than 90 per cent of global sequencing data. The technology has also contributed to the development of precision medicine and large-scale genomic research.
