Pezcoller Foundation

The Pezcoller Foundation in Trento was founded by Professor Alessio Pezcoller and has given prizes to researchers since 1988 and scholarships since 2006. Its best-known prize is the Pezcoller Foundation-AACR International Award for Extraordinary Achievement in Cancer Research, worth 75,000 euros, created with the American Association for Cancer Research under an agreement signed in 1997 and renewed in 2018. The AACR describes it as recognising a scientist who has made a major discovery in basic cancer research or significant contributions to translational research and who is still active; Nobel laureates are not eligible. The winner lectures at the AACR Annual Meeting and at the Universities of Padua and Trento before the ceremony in Trento.

It replaced the Premio Internazionale Pezcoller, given to V. De Vita in 1988, M. Tubiana in 1991, Bert Vogelstein in 1993 and Paul Nurse in 1995. Winners of the joint award since 1998 include James P. Allison (2015), John E. Dick (2020), Steven A. Rosenberg (2022), Tak W. Mak (2023), Titia de Lange (2024) and Douglas Hanahan (2025). The foundation also gives, with the European Association for Cancer Research, a Translational Cancer Researcher Award, a Women in Cancer Research Award and a Rising Star Award.