Hossein Baharvand, founder and head of the biology and stem cell technologies research center (Royan), won the 2019 World Academy of Sciences (TWAS) Prize in the field of biology. The TWAS is a valid international unit, mission of which is development and helping the scientific progress of developing countries.

According to the public relations and information center of the Vice-Presidency for science and technology affairs, in this organization that is supervised by UNESCO, there are more than one thousand and 100 top scientists, including 15 Nobel Prize winners. Every year, the TWAS awards scientists of developing countries in nine scientific fields due to their outstanding role in the progress and use of science and technology to develop sustainability.

In 2019, the unit gave its prize to Hossein Baharvand, a professor in Royan Research Center, due to his valuable services in production and maintenance of stem cells and presenting comprehensive definitions on pluripotency and the differentiation of these cells into neurons, cardiac and liver cells.

For the first time, an Iranian scientist in the field of biology has been able to receive this prize, which will be awarded next year officially during the 29^th general conference of TWAS.

Hossein Baharvand is a prominent professor and founder and head of the Royan Research Center. For the first time in 2003, he was able to produce human and rat stem cells. In 2008, he was able to produce human and mouse induced pluripotent stem cells with the help of his coworkers.

These activities have enabled him and his colleagues to base and follow up various branches of regenerative medicine in Iran. His research fields included the promotion of translation research and regenerative medicine studies from the perspective of stem cells, developmental biology and engineering inspired by nature for tissue and cell engineering studies

He has participated in several clinical trials and tissue stem cell transplantations. He has also been active in the development of industrial production of cells. To date, more than 350 international scientific articles and four books (English) have been published by Springer and John Wiley. To date, he has received 30 national and international prizes, including the international prize of UNESCO in biology sciences in 2014 due to research on stem cells and their application in regenerative medicine in line with improvement of quality of life of people. Moreover, he was introduced among 20 most effective figures in the field of stem cells by the valid website of Niche at the global level.