On May 18, the 2026 International Congress of Basic Science (ICBS 2026) was held at Tsinghua University. The conference officially announced the winners of the inaugural ICBS Medal and the 2026 Frontier Science Award. Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and Researcher at the Institute of High Energy Physics (IHEP) of CAS, Prof. WANG Yifang was awarded the ICBS Medal of Basic Sciences in physics for his pioneering contributions to experimental particle physics, together with Prof. Andrea J. Liu and Prof. Xiao-Gang Wen.

Prof. Shing-Tung Yau, President of ICBS; Prof. Caucher Birkar, Fields Medalist and Professor at Tsinghua University; Prof. CAO Jun, Director of IHEP; and Prof. GAO Huajian, Dean of the Institute of Mechanics and Engineering at Tsinghua University and Member of the U.S. National Academies of Sciences and Engineering attended the press conference. The pioneering achievements of the laureates were elaborated in depth at the event.

ICBS highly commended Academician WANG Yifang: “The 2026 ICBS Samuel C.C. Ting Medal in Physics is awarded to WANG Yifang for his pioneering discovery of a new type of neutrino oscillation and the first precise measurement of the mixing angle θ₁₃. He led the construction of the Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO), which aims to determine the neutrino mass ordering and continues to explore new physics beyond the Standard Model.” WANG is an outstanding physicist whose academic achievements have profoundly reshaped research in contemporary high-energy physics and neutrino physics. His most landmark contribution is the co-discovery of the neutrino mixing angle θ₁₃ through the Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment. This achievement has catalyzed the scientific community’s conventional understanding of neutrino oscillation patterns and propelled the field into an entirely new paradigm. He subsequently led the JUNO project, laying a solid foundation for the global effort to address the challenge of measuring the neutrino mass ordering.

WANG has also made remarkable achievements in the development of large-scale detector technology and international scientific cooperation. By designing ultra-sensitive liquid scintillator systems, he has greatly enhanced the precision and discrimination capability of reactor antineutrino detection, expanding the frontiers of experimental physics. With long-term dedication to cutting-edge research, he integrates profound theoretical insight into physics with sophisticated engineering expertise, establishing key theoretical frameworks that underpin the renewed understanding of modern particle physics from an interdisciplinary perspective.

Established for the first time in 2026, the Medals of Basic Sciences aim to honor scientists worldwide who have made revolutionary and breakthrough accomplishments in basic science, in recognition of their exceptional contributions to scientific progress. The awards cover three disciplines: mathematics, physics, and engineering. Three medals are established for each discipline, named after nine towering figures in the history of science:

• Mathematics: Emmy Noether, Shiing-Shen Chern, Andrew Wiles

• Physics: Marie Curie, Samuel C.C. Ting, David Gross

• Engineering: Chien-Shiung Wu, Steven Chu, Charles K. Kao

For his outstanding contributions to particle physics, WANG has received numerous prestigious awards, including the Zhou Guangzhao Foundation Award for Basic Sciences, Ho Leung Ho Lee Foundation Prize for Scientific and Technological Progress, First Class State Natural Science Award (ranked first), W.K.H. Panofsky Prize in Experimental Particle Physics of the American Physical Society, Nikkei Asia Prize for Science, Technology and Innovation, Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics, Bruno Pontecorvo Prize, Future Science Prize in Physical Science, and the High Energy and Particle Physics Prize of the European Physical Society for his leadership of the research team.