SINGAPORE - For more than three decades, Professor Lam Khin Yong has pushed for scientific research that impacts society, and has personally played a key role in shaping Singapore's pool of scientific talent.

The vice-president of research at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) pushed strongly for collaboration between industry, academia and public agencies, and led multiple mergers and organisations such as the Institute of High Performance Computing.

For his lifetime of work, he was one of the recipients on Tuesday evening (Sept 25) of the President's Science and Technology Awards, the country's highest honour for scientific achievement.

The awards comprise three different categories: the President's Science and Technology Medals, the President's Science Award, and the President's Technology Award.

Four individuals and one team received the awards from President Halimah Yacob at Capella Singapore.

Said Prof Lam, 62: "I feel very honoured. Our efforts over the years are truly the result of dedicated teamwork. I am grateful to many, many colleagues who have supported my journey and who have made equally great contributions towards building Singapore into a global research hub.

"With this award, I am driven to continue pushing for basic and translational research, as well as partnerships."

Also given out at the same ceremony were three Young Scientist Awards, which recognise the accomplishments of researchers under 35 years old who have shown potential to achieve even more in their field.

Minister for Finance Heng Swee Keat presented the awards to the winners.

One of the recipients was Dr Anjan Soumyanarayanan from the Agency for Science, Technology and Research's (A*Star) Institute of Materials Research and Engineering.

Dr Anjan worked on incorporating quantum materials to develop advanced nanoelectronics, and his work has been published in multiple scientific journals such as Nature, Science, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and Physical Review.

Dr Anjan, 34, said: "This award recognises the unique capabilities built by our interdisciplinary A*Star team in the last five years. It is a great honour, and living up to the illustrious history of its alumni is quite a challenge."

He added: "I hope that with this recognition, we can translate our achievements to impactful outcomes for the country."