The MacArthur Foundation announced 25 "genius" grant winners Wednesday.
Why it matters: The award is seen as one of the most coveted and distinguished honors in academia, arts and science, and it includes a massive cash prize.
Driving the news: The 2022 list of MacArthur Fellows included an ornithologist, a computer scientist and a human rights activist, among others.
- The MacArthur Fellows will receive an $800,000 grant, which is a "no-strings-attached award to extraordinarily talented and creative individuals as an investment in their potential," according to the MacArthur Foundation website.
- The foundation did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment.
- Below are the the 25 recipients.
2022 MacArthur Fellows grant winners
Jennifer Carlson is a sociologist from Tucson, Arizona, who has been investigating gun culture in the United States.
Paul Chan is an artist from New York who has depicted political and social topics.
Yejin Choi is a computer scientist from Seattle who has helped "develop artificial intelligence-based systems that can perform commonsense reasoning," per the foundation's website.
P. Gabrielle Foreman is a historian and digital humanist from University Park, Penn., who has researched early African American activism.
Danna Freedman, a chemist from Cambridge, Mass., has worked to create "novel molecular materials with unique properties directly relevant to quantum information science," the foundation said.
Martha Gonzalez, a musician and artist from Claremont, California, has used art to build community and promote social justice.
Sky Hopinka is a filmmaker from Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, whose films elevate Indigenous perspectives.
June Huh, a mathematician from Princeton, New Jersey, has made connections between combinatorics and algebraic geometry.
Moriba Jah is an astrodynamicist from Austin, Texas, who has worked to create solutions for Earth's orbital structures.
Jenna Jambeck is an environmental engineer from Athens, Georgia, who has investigated the scale of plastic pollution and has worked to stop plastic waste.
Monica Kim, a historian from Madison, Wisc., has researched the relationship between U.S. foreign policy and global decolonization.
Robin Wall Kimmerer, a plant ecologist and writer from Syracuse, New York, who has been researching how to build a better environment through scientific and Indigenous information.
Priti Krishtel, a health justice lawyer from Oakland, California, has worked to build access to affordable medications.
Joseph Drew Lanham, an ornithologist and writer from Clemson, S.C., has researched the impacts of forest management on birds and wildlife.
Kiese Laymon is a Houston, Texas, writer who examines Black people's experience with violence.
Reuben Jonathan Miller is a sociologist from Chicago who has researched the aftermath of incarceration, primarily among communities of color.
Ikue Mori, an electronic music composer from New York, has expanded the range of technical music space through her own techniques.
Steven Prohira, a physicist from Lawrence, Kansas, has used new tools to research "ultra-high energy sub-atomic particles" that could help us all understand the universe.
Tomeka Reid, a jazz cellist and composer from Chicago, has used a number of musical traditions to create her unique sound.
Loretta J. Ross, a human rights advocate from Northampton, Mass., has worked to link social justice and human rights with reproductive justice.
Steven Ruggles, a historical demographer from Minneapolis, Minnesota, has helped build the world's largest public database of population statistics (the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series).
Tavares Strachan is an artist from New York and The Bahamas who has promoted "overlooked contributions of marginalized figures throughout history" by using science, history and other projects, per the foundation's site.
Emily Wang is a primary care physician and researcher from New Haven, Connecticut, who has studied the health effects of incarceration and people exiting prison.
Amanda Williams is an artist from Chicago whose work "uses ideas around color and architecture to explore the intersection of race and the built environment," per the foundation's website.
Melanie Matchett Wood, a mathematician from Cambridge, Mass., has used number theory and algebraic geometry to provide a new understanding of the properties of numbers.
