28 March 2025
James Eills, head of the Young Investigator Group for Hyperpolarization Methods at the Institute of Structural Biochemistry (IBI-7) at Forschungszentrum Jülich, has been awarded the prestigious Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize 2025. The German Research Foundation (DFG) announced the award on Friday, 28 March, in Bonn, Germany. Dr Eills is being honoured for his work in the field of Analytical Chemistry, and in particular for hyperpolarization in nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). The funding of €200,000 will support his research over the next three years.
Eills' research is at the interface between physics and chemistry. Among other things, he is working on the topic of hyperpolarization for nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). This is a method that significantly improves magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). NMR uses the magnetic properties of atomic nuclei. Similar to the way a compass needle aligns in a magnetic field, the spins - the intrinsic angular momentum - of certain atomic nuclei also tend to orient along an applied magnetic field axis. This alignment, or polarization, is a quantum effect, caused by the spin of the nuclei. The effect is weak, meaning that even at the highest attainable magnetic fields on the order of 30 Tesla - a million times stronger than the earth's magnetic field - only one in every ten thousand nuclei aligns with the magnetic field. Despite this low spin polarization, NMR has had a huge impact on physics, life sciences and medicine, as it allows the quantitative and non-invasive study of gases, liquids and solids.
Eills' research focuses in particular on parahydrogen hyperpolarization. This involves using hydrogen gas in a specific quantum state ("para"-hydrogen) to deliver hyperpolarization into other molecules. This way, certain metabolic molecules can be used as contrast agents whose metabolic processes can be tracked in real-time as a marker that may indicate various diseases or pathologies.
With his work Eills has made a number of important contributions to this field of research, developing new methods new ways to hyperpolarize molecules, and carry out microfluidic lab-on-a-chip NMR experiments.
Congratulations to James Eills on this wonderful success! We are proud that a young scientist from Jülich has been awarded the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize by the German Research Foundation. This confirms our commitment to providing targeted support for young talent. At Forschungszentrum Jülich, we consciously create space for excellent young talent and give them the opportunity to creatively develop their innovative ideas - an approach that has proven successful, as James Eills' example impressively demonstrates.
International research journey
After his undergraduate studies in Chemistry at the University of Southampton, Eills carried out his master's research at the University of California, Berkeley. He then returned to Southampton to work under Prof. Malcolm H. Levitt on his doctoral thesis in the field of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), which he completed in 2019. He continued his research as a postdoc at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany, where he joined the group of Prof. Dmitry Budker to work on zero-field NMR and hyperpolarization methods. Together with his colleagues, his postdoctoral research on hyperpolarization methods for NMR won the 2021 Erwin Schrödinger Award of the Helmholtz Association. This was followed by a two-year research stay at the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) in Barcelona as part of a Marie Curie fellowship. In 2023 he won a grant for €1.5M to set up a Helmholtz Young Investigator Group to investigate new hyperpolarization technology for NMR. In 2024, James Eills established his research group at Forschungszentrum Jülich.
The Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize
The winners were selected by a jury from 180 nominations. The prizes are to be awarded in Berlin, 3 June 2025.
Named after the physicist and former DFG President Heinz Maier-Leibnitz, the prize has been awarded annually since 1977 to outstanding young researchers. The Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize has been named the third most important science prize by leading German research institutions, after the DFG's Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize and the German Future Prize awarded by the German President. For young researchers, it is considered the most important award in Germany. The prize money of 200,000 euros is intended to support the development of scientific careers for up to three years.
Further Information
Contact Person
- Institute of Biological Information Processing (IBI)
- Structural Biochemistry (IBI-7)
