Ricardo Miledi and Enrique Moreno Prince of Asturias Award for Technical & Scientific Research 1999

Ricardo Miledi (Mexico D.F., Mexico, 1927 - California, United States, 2017), one of the ten most quoted neuro-biologists of all time, was born in Mexico, D.F. in 1927. His career in science began in 1955 when, just before graduating in Medicine at the Universidad Autónoma de Mexico (UNAM), he joined one of the most active research groups in his country, part of the Instituto Nacional de Cardiología (the National Institute of Cardiology). He has been Professor of Biophysics at the University of London and is currently an Extraordinary Researcher at the Institute of Neurobiology at Querétaro, Mexico, and Distinguished Professor at the University of California at Irvine.

Many of Professor Miledi´s studies and breakthroughs in Neurobiology, especially those related to the mechanisms of synaptic and neuromuscular transmission, are considered to be classic throughout the world. His research in this field has proved basic to an understanding of how information is transmitted from the brain, and how this organ is affected by drugs and toxic substances. Over 450 publications are the tangible product of forty years of research devoted in the main to the primary functions of the nervous system: the transmission of information between cells.

He has been an honorary member of the National Academy of Medicine of Mexico since 1995 and was awarded an honorary degree by the University of the Basque Country in 1992. He has been a Fellow of The Royal Society of London since 1970 and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1986. He was awarded an honorary degree by the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) in 2007.

Enrique Moreno, (Madrid, Spain, 1939), has a Doctorate in Medicine from the Universidad Complutense of Madrid, where he is Professor of Surgical Pathology. He is also Head of the General Surgery and Abdominal Transplant Service at Madrid´s 12 de Octubre Hospital (12th October Hospital), is considered one of the world´s foremost authorities on surgery and transplants, and as an innovator in modern surgical techniques.

Doctor Moreno González is one of the pioneers of liver transplants and of surgery on complex gastro-intestinal, pancreatic and liver conditions. He has a world-wide reputation as a surgeon and researcher, and is an important educationalist in the field. He has built up around his person an outstanding international school in his speciality, where 400 specialists from around the world have been trained.

His contributions to the treatment of portal hypertension, malignant tumours of the bile duct, and carcinoma and metastases of the liver are of major importance. He has developed new surgical procedures, such as the mesentery-vena of the internal jugular vein by-pass, or treatment for cardia cancer by enlarged esophagogastrectomies.

He has worked intensively to raise and improve organ donation rates in Spain, and has done research into transplant-improving techniques.

He is a member of both the Royal Academy of Medicine, and of the Society of Medical Surgeons of Spain, and is an honorary member of surgeons´ associations in many countries (such as the U.S.A., France, Portugal, Italy, Argentina, Colombia, Chile, Venezuela, Panama, etc.), as well as being a member of many other institutions. He has been awarded the gold medal by the World Congress of the International College of Surgeons, the Semmelweis Medal by the University of Budapest, is doctor honoris causa of the University of Palermo, and Honorary Professor at different American and European universities. He was voted Doctor of the Year in 1985 and Doctor of the Decade, amongst other honours.