Jan Vilcek

Joseph Sonnabend, a physician, virologist, and multi-talented individual, who participated in pioneering studies on virus replication and on the mechanism of action of interferon, died in London on January 24, 2021. He will, however, be best remembered for his activism and contributions to research during the early stages of the AIDS epidemic. His career in general was certainly anything but conventional.Joseph was born in South Africa but growing up in what is now Zimbabwe, where his Russian-born mother was a practicing physician. His father, a sociologist, was an active Zionist. Joseph lived in a highly cultured atmosphere that endowed him with a love for art and classical music. Throughout his life he played the piano and the organ. He studied medicine at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, and was trained in infectious diseases at The Royal College of Physicians in Edinburgh …

The U.S. government has sought to restrict immigration under the "America First" doctrine. These policies severely harm American science by stripping it of talent and eliminating a major driver of its innovation engine. We urge scientists to work to reverse these policies and forcefully condemn anti-immigrant sentiments.

In 2006, the New York City-based Vilcek Foundation created an annual prize program for foreign-born biomedical scientists who have made major contributions to their fields while living and working in the United States. The founders, themselves immigrants from Czechoslovakia, established the program to raise public awareness of the indispensable role of immigrant scientists in ensuring the United States’ leadership on the world science stage. Recipients currently receive a cash award and commemorative sculpture designed by New York-based graphic designer Stefan Sagmeister. Over the past 15 years, scientists born in 12 different countries have been selected by a jury of peers to receive Vilcek Prizes, illustrating the diversity of backgrounds of immigrant scientists in the United States who become leaders in their fields of study. In 2009 the prize program was expanded to include a second tier of prizes, Vilcek …