King Faisal Awards of 2013 Announced

The King Faisal Foundation of Saudi Arabia has announced the winners of the International King Faisal Awards of 2013. These awards recognize the work performed by notable domestic and foreign personages in fields such as Science, Medicine, Arabic Language and Literature, Islamic Studies and Service to Islam.

The winners of this 35th edition of the awards, announced in Riyadh, are:
- In the category of Service to Islam, Shaikh Rai'd Salah Mahagna (Palestine).
- In Arab Language and Literature, the award is for the individual and institutional efforts made in writing Arabic dictionaries by the Arabic Language Academy in Cairo (Egypt).
- In Medicine, for their studies on the Genetics of Obesity, the award is shared by Professors Jeffrey Michael Friedman and Douglas Leonard Coleman (United States).
- In Science, for their studies in Physics, Professors Paul B. Corkum (Canada) and Ferenc Krausz (Hungary).

The King Faisal Foundation was created in 1976 by the eight sons of the late King Faisal ibn Abd Al Aziz, one of the sons of Saudi Arabia’s founder and the Kingdom’s third monarch. This ongoing homage to a great man has revitalized the Arab and Islamic tradition of philanthropy.

Amongst the Foundation’s many philanthropic activities, the International King Faisal Award is one of the most greatly known. Attracting attention to important topics and providing recompense to talented scientists who have made these matters a priority in their careers, the direct and indirect effects of this award are expected to be widespread.

The awards for Service to Islam, Islamic Studies and Arabic Literature were created in 1977 and given for the first time in 1979. In 1981, the Awards Council added the category of Medicine, and one year later that of Science. The two were granted for the first time in 1982 and 1984, respectively.