They are part of an elite few — a bioengineer who wants others to have the microscope he couldn’t afford as a child in India and a financial innovator, orphaned in Mexico at age 9, who creates pathways to credit for poor people.

These and two other Bay Area residents — a graphic novelist and a sculptor — are among the recipients of this year’s MacArthur Foundation “genius grants,” a $625,000 gift over five years that offers unfettered freedom to pursue creative and high-impact work.

The annual awards, announced Wednesday night by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, reward every field of human endeavor, from theoretical physics to urban farming.

Ten of this year’s 24 winners are Californians. New York claims seven. The Bay Area always claims a disproportionate share of grants — this year, as historically, about one-sixth of recipients live here.

“It is a high honor,” said Jose A. Quinonez, of Oakland, whose model for creating pathways to mainstream financial services is improving peoples’ economic stability. “I am going to dedicate my time and energy to do more for those in the financial shadows.”

While recipients have a track record of achievement, the fellowship is not a reward for past accomplishment, but an investment in a person’s originality and potential.

Even for such extraordinarily creative individuals, conventional funding for their ideas can be hard to find. Many funding agencies are reluctant to support experimental and unconventional work.

The MacArthur Foundation is the 12th largest private foundation in America. One of seven children, John MacArthur was born in an impoverished coal-producing area of eastern Pennsylvania and went on to own the nation’s largest privately held insurance company. Wife Catherine MacArthur, one of nine children born to Irish immigrants on the South Side of Chicago, was his business partner.

No one can apply to win the fellowship; nominees are brought to the program’s attention through a constantly changing pool of invited external nominators chosen from as broad a range of fields and areas of interest as possible. And no one knows if they are even being considered — so it’s a complete surprise if they win.

Manu Prakash, the Stanford bioengineer, was holding one of his four-month-old twins when the 6 a.m. call came to the San Francisco home he shares with his wife, a cell biologist at UCSF. “I almost didn’t pick it up,” he laughed.

When Quinonez reached for the phone, he also was awake — but was stunned by the news. “I still haven’t fully digested it. There are some moments I think: ‘Did I get that call? Did it really happen?'”

All of the Bay Area winners trace their passion back to childhood. The foundation honored:

Gene Luen Yang, of San Jose, a graphic novelist and cartoonist whose work for young adults, seen through a contemporary Chinese-American lens, shows how comics can broaden our understanding of diverse cultures and people. Yang bought his first comic book in fifth grade. “In the story, an atomic bomb drops on the world in 1986,” he recounted. “When I read it, something similar happened to my brain.” He started out as a computer programme r, then became a computer science teacher at Oakland’s Bishop O’Dowd High School, making comic books at night.

computer science teacher at Oakland’s Bishop O’Dowd High School, making comic books at night. Vincent Fecteau, of San Francisco, a sculptor whose deceptively intricate handmade works made primarily from papier-mache seem to hover on the verge of instability. From each perspective, the object seems slightly different, with twists and swerves. Fecteau told the online magazine Bomb that “I’ve always made things … but never took a sculpture class. I don’t know how to weld, cast, carve stone or work with wood,” he said. “Papier-mache was the lowest tech, the cheapest way I could make larger, paintable forms. You work with what you have.”

José A. Quiñonez, of Oakland, founder and CEO of San Francisco’s Mission Asset Fund, links rotating credit associations or “lending circles,” a traditional cultural practice from Latin America, Asia and Africa, to the formal financial sector. Without bank accounts or a credit history, it is nearly impossible for people to obtain safe loans for automobiles, homes and businesses or to rent an apartment. Quiñonez and his five siblings struggled with poverty during their childhoods in San Jose, where they were raised by relatives after the death of their parents, rural ranchers. While former President Ronald Reagan’s amnesty bill gave him legal status, “we lived in the shadows of society, feeling unwanted and unwelcome,” Quiñonez recalled. After studying at UC Berkeley, “I realized that credit is a linchpin in helping people reach financial security.”

Manu Prakash, of San Francisco, assistant professor in the Department of Bioengineering at Stanford, invents frugal devices to solve difficult problems in global health, science education and ecological surveillance. His “Ten Thousand Microscopes Project” has given away 50,000 “foldscope” kits in 135 countries to entice young minds to become the world’s future scientists — and to solve real-world problems, like identifying eggs of agricultural pests, spotting fake currency, detecting bacteria in water samples and more. Born in the village of Meerut, India, Prakash loved building things. As a child, he made his own matchstick-fueled replica of a rocket and 3-D jigsaw puzzle out of rabbit bones. Incredible inventions could be created using the most basic resources, he learned.

“Curiosity is such a wonderful thing,” Prakash said. “But it you’re not in a lab — if you’re out in the middle of nowhere — where do you get the tools to answer your questions? I want others to enjoy exploring the world. … To be supported in this way, with this award, is a humbling experience,” he said. “Who knows where it will go? There are lots of things in my head.”