Professor Steve Mann is the 2011 winner of the RSC de Gennes Prize and Medal, which is awarded for outstanding and exceptional work in the field of materials chemistry. Professor Dek Woolfson has won the 2011 Medimmune Protein and Peptide Science Award of the RSC Protein and Peptide Science Group. This is the first year for this award, which recognises excellence in the area of protein and peptide science.