TWAS – The Academy of Sciences for the Developing World – is the point of reference for over 700 scientists from emerging and developing countries. Located in the city of Trieste, TWAS is recognized at a global level and supports the research of these scientists offering them the opportunity to exchange opinions and documentation.

Since 2005, illycaffè and TWAS have awarded the Trieste Science Prize. Every year, an award of $100,000 is assigned to projects in different disciplines. The researchers are chosen by an international scientific jury, based on the value of their project or research on one of the main themes that concern the life of our planet.

Participation is reserved to scientists from the emerging or developing world who live and work in the southern hemisphere of the world, and who have received recognition at an international level for their research at institutes of their countries. This is why the prize is informally defined, in the scientific community, as the "Nobel prize of the emerging and developing countries".

In 2009, the Ernesto Illy Foundation began supporting this award, now known as the Ernesto Illy Trieste Science Prize.

The 2009 award ceremony was held in October in Durban, South Africa. The two winning scientists, the Indian Pramod Kumar Aggarwal and the Brazilian Carlos Clemente Cerri, were awarded for their research dedicated to climate change and its impact on agriculture in developing countries.

José Goldemberg, a world-renowned energy expert who helped lay the scientific foundation for Brazil's biofuels programme and who subsequently became a leading advocate for the adoption of "leapfrog" technologies to promote economic development in the developing world, won the 2010 Ernesto Illy Trieste Science Prize.

To learn more, visit the TWAS website: twas.ictp.it