The Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences & the scope of innovation

A prize that furthers progress in the life sciences is to be welcomed and the winners certainly lauded. Logic would dictate that The Life Sciences Breakthrough Prize and the funding behind it targets the hard sciences: biology, physics and chemistry and the vast and growing number of associated specialist disciplines.

'Life', however, as in living is more than a binary operation - as the FT Weekend editorial notes:

Those eureka ideas

... It would be good to see more daring choices in the future: those outside the well-trodden circuit of university departments and research institutions in the industrialised world.
Breakthroughs in life science go beyond the laboratory to interactions with patients, doctors, public health officials, drug companies and regulators. They should also tap into advances in information technology. ...

(Financial Times - FT Weekend, page 10, 9th - 10th March 2013)