Glittering prizes

Ettore Sottsas, 81, has received the 1999 Sir Misha Black Memorial Medal for Distinguished Service to Design Education. The medal, instituted as a memorial to designer and teacher Sir Misha Black after his death in 1977, was awarded to Sottsas for his major contribution to industrial design, particularly for Olivetti, and for "refreshing the design debate in a way that has reached new generations of students".

Norman McNally, head of the centre for art and design at the Glasgow School of Art, has received the inaugural Misha Black Award for innovation in design education for his vision and work in design education at Glasgow and the University of Ulster.

The award reflects changes in the world of design education since the original Sir Misha Black memorial medal.

Sir Tom Blundell, Sir William Dunn professor at the University of Cambridge, is to receive a fellowship from the University of Cambridge for his work on structural and molecular biology in medicine, agriculture and modern biotechnology.