Karl Deisseroth, Peter Hegemann, and Georg Nagel win 2026 Nobel Prize in Medicine

The Nobel Prize committee awarded the 2026 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine to Karl Deisseroth, Peter Hegemann, and Georg Nagel for discoveries in optogenetics.

The committee recognized their research into brain activity and controlling neural circuits with light-driven neural switches.

Georg Nagel was born in 1953 and received his Ph.D. from the University of Frankfurt, Germany.

Nagel is professor of molecular plant physiology at the Department for Molecular Plant Physiology and Biophysics - Botany I, University.

For Indian-origin researchers, neuroscientists, and STEM scholars in the U.S., the recognition highlights advances in controlling neural circuits with light.