MacArthur "genius" grant recipients: Here are the 2022 winners

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Here' s who won the 2022 MacArthur genius grants

Tomeka Reid at the Hungry Brain in Chicago. Photo: Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images The announced 25 "genius" grant winners Wednesday. Why it matters: The award is seen as one of the most coveted and distinguished honors in academia, and science, and it includes a massive cash prize. Driving the news: The included an ornithologist, a computer scientist and a human rights activist, among others.The will receive an $800,000 grant, which is a "no-strings-attached award to extraordinarily talented and creative individuals as an investment in their potential," according to the MacArthur Foundation .The foundation did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment.Below are the the 25 recipients.

2022 MacArthur Fellows grant winners

is a sociologist from Tucson, Arizona, who has been investigating gun culture in the United States. is an artist from New York who has depicted political and social topics. is a computer scientist from Seattle who has helped "develop artificial intelligence-based systems that can perform commonsense reasoning," per the is a historian and digital humanist from University Park, Penn., who has researched early African American activism. , a chemist from Cambridge, Mass., has worked to create "novel molecular materials with unique properties directly relevant to quantum information science," the foundation said. , a musician and artist from Claremont, California, has used art to build community and promote social justice. is a filmmaker from Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, whose films elevate Indigenous perspectives. , a mathematician from Princeton, New Jersey, has made connections between combinatorics and algebraic geometry. is an astrodynamicist from Austin, Texas, who has worked to create solutions for Earth's orbital structures. is an environmental engineer from Athens, Georgia, who has investigated the scale of plastic pollution and has worked to stop plastic waste. , a historian from Madison, Wisc., has researched the relationship between U.S. foreign policy and global decolonization. , a plant ecologist and writer from Syracuse, New York, who has been researching how to build a better environment through scientific and Indigenous information. , a health justice lawyer from Oakland, California, has worked to build access to affordable medications. , an ornithologist and writer from Clemson, S.C., has researched the impacts of forest management on birds and wildlife. is a Houston, Texas, writer who examines Black people's experience with violence. is a sociologist from Chicago who has researched the aftermath of incarceration, primarily among communities of color. , an electronic music composer from New York, has expanded the range of technical music space through her own techniques. , a physicist from Lawrence, Kansas, has used new tools to research "ultra-high energy sub-atomic particles" that could help us all understand the universe. , a jazz cellist and composer from Chicago, has used a number of musical traditions to create her unique sound. , a human rights advocate from Northampton, Mass., has worked to link social justice and human rights with reproductive justice. , a historical demographer from Minneapolis, Minnesota, has helped build the world's largest public database of population statistics (the ). is an artist from New York and The Bahamas who has promoted "overlooked contributions of marginalized figures throughout history" by using science, history and other projects, per the foundation's site. is a primary care physician and researcher from New Haven, Connecticut, who has studied the health effects of incarceration and people exiting prison. is an artist from Chicago whose work "uses ideas around color and architecture to explore the intersection of race and the built environment," per the foundation's website. , a mathematician from Cambridge, Mass., has used number theory and algebraic geometry to provide a new understanding of the properties of numbers.

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