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Artur Lind

Artur Lind (1927-1989) was an Estonian molecular biologist, who is also considered the founder of this field in Estonia. He studied protein biosynthesis, molecular biology methods, the structure of ribonucleic acid, methods for determining the sequence of deoxyribonucleic acid, oncogenes, and the structure and function of the ribosome, including being the first to isolate low-molecular-weight ribonucleic acid (5S-RNA) from eukaryotic ribosomes. Many of today’s Estonian top scientists in the filed have worked and studied under him, such as Richard Villems, Mart Saarma, Mart Ustav, Toivo Maimets and Andres Metspalu.

To honor Artur Lind’s significant contribution to Estonian science, the Estonian Genome Foundation established the Artur Lind Scholarship Fund in 2001. The purpose of this fund is to support the academic activities of students and researchers in Estonia in the fields of genetics and biotechnology through targeted scholarships.

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After a brief hiatus, the Institute of Genomics of University of Tartu, in collaboration with the Estonian Genome Foundation have restored the scholarship fund since year 2024. We are pleased to once again invite all doctoral students studying in Estonia, whose work is related to biomedicine, biotechnology, genomics, molecular biology, and adjacent fields, to apply for the scholarship. The scholarship will be ceremonially handed over at the Gene Forum conference.

The award fund of the scholarship is

5000 €

How to apply for the scholarship?

To apply for the scholarship, please submit the following:

  • Candidate’s CV
  • Letter of recommendation from supervisor
  • 3 to 5-minute short video on the topic: “Beyond the Lab: The Human Impact of My Science”

     

Please send the link to the video along with additional documentation via e-mail to geneforum@ut.ee.

Important information about the scholarship

The purpose of the Artur Lind Scholarship fund is to recognise doctoral students studying in Estonian universities whose research topic is related to biomedicine, biotechnology, genomics, molecular biology and adjacent fields

  • This year’s prize fund of the scholarship is €5,000.
  • The scholarship committee has the right to divide the scholarship fund into several smaller scholarships if necessary, in the event that among the applications received, more than one applicant stands out.
  • If the scholarship competition does not receive applications of sufficient level and justification, the scholarship committee has the right not to award the scholarship that year.
  • The Artur Lind Scholarship statute can be found he

The application deadline is 4. August 2026

Meet our Scholarship Committee members

Artur Lind scholarship awardees

Over the years a total of 50 students have received the scholarship. In 2025, a total of 3 scholarships were given out to doctoral students who applied to the scholarship with a 3-5 minute video on the topic “Human and Artificial Intelligence in Science in 2035”. You can watch the last year awardees videos here

Click here for the list of previous Artur Lind Scholarship Fund awardees
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Scholarship awardees 2025

In 2025, the Artur Lind scholarship committee received a total of 5 applications with diverse approaches and inspirational videos on the topic “Human and Artificial Intelligence in Science in 2035”. After careful considerations, the 8-member committee decided to give out 3 scholarships. 1 main prize in the amount of 2500€ and 2 special prizes (for artistic achievement and content) in the amount of 1250€.

Merve Nur Güler

1st year PhD student at University of Tartu, Institute of Genomics

Birgit Malken

Artistic award

2nd year PhD student of Genomics at University of Tartu, Institute of Genomics

Marilin Moor

Special award for Content

1st year PhD student at University of Tartu, Institute of Computer Science.