Here's the list of 2026 MacArthur 'genius' grant winners : NPR

Key Points:

• The MacArthur Foundation awarded 20 diverse individuals with $800,000 "genius grants" for their innovative work across fields such as climate science, history, art, and health.
• Climate-focused fellows include Holly Jean Buck, Kaiyu Guan, and Marika Holland, who address ethical climate policies, use machine learning for sustainable agriculture, and study polar sea ice dynamics respectively.
• Historians and economists like Elizabeth Ellis and Ellora Derenoncourt are reshaping narratives on Indigenous sovereignty and racial wage gaps in America through groundbreaking research.
• Artists and scholars such as Maaza Mengiste, Vincent Valdez, and Kate Spradley explore themes of political violence, memory, justice, and migrant repatriation through novels, visual art, and forensic anthropology.
• Innovators in health and communication, including Liangfang Zhang, Christine Sun Kim, and Bryan Washington, are advancing drug delivery systems, redefining sound perception for the deaf, and exploring healing in modern relationships.