Nominations are currently open for Britain's first-ever international Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering, which has been created to honor individuals for groundbreaking innovation that benefits humanity — and which rewards the winner handsomely with a staggering ￡1 million (¥123 million).
The prize, whose creation was spearheaded by Oliver Tetwin, minister of state at the Cabinet Office, sprang from "a growing realization within political, business and engineering circles of the need for a pioneering initiative based in the U.K. to focus attention on engineering worldwide," according to the prize's official website.
Mostly sponsored by major corporations including Sony and Toshiba, the prize will be presented in London next spring by Queen Elizabeth II herself.