Gold Medal from the Royal Astronomical Society
The Royal Astronomical Society Gold Medal is the highest scientific award awarded by the Royal Astronomical Society .
The medal was first awarded in 1824. After being awarded several times in the first few years, it was only awarded once a year from 1833 onwards. In 1846, the discovery of Neptune created a problem, as both John Couch Adams and Urbain Le Verrier were often considered worthy of prizes. The emerging controversy was finally resolved in 1848 by awarding "Medals of Recognition" to twelve award winners, including Adams and Le Verrier. From 1849 onwards, there was no more than one price per year. Adams and Le Verrier finally received their gold medals in 1866 and 1868.
Since 1964 two gold medals have been awarded, one ('A') for astronomy , cosmology , astroparticle physics , cosmophysics and related fields, the other ('G') for geophysics , solar physics , solar-terrestrial relations and planetary research.
The image of the medal shows an image of Wilhelm Herschel's 40-foot reflector telescope from the company's coat of arms and its Latin motto QUICQUID NITET NOTANDUM (something like “Whatever seems, may be recorded”).
Award winners
- 1824: Charles Babbage , Johann Franz Encke
- 1826: John Herschel , James South , Wilhelm Struve
- 1827: Francis Baily
- 1828: Sir Thomas Brisbane , James Dunlop , Caroline Herschel
- 1829: Rev. William Pearson , Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel , Heinrich Christian Schumacher
- 1830: William Richardson , Johann Franz Encke
- 1831: Captain Henry Kater , Baron Marie-Charles-Théodore Damoiseau
- 1833: George Biddell Airy
- 1835: Lieut. Manuel J. Johnson
- 1836: John Herschel
- 1837: Otto August Rosenberger
- 1839: The Hon. John Wrottesley
- 1840: Giovanni Antonio Amedeo Plana
- 1841: Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel
- 1842: Peter Andreas Hansen
- 1843: Francis Baily
- 1845: Captain William Henry Smyth
- 1846: George Biddell Airy
- 1849: William Lassell
- 1850: Otto Wilhelm von Struve
- 1851: Annibale De Gasparis
- 1852: Christian August Friedrich Peters
- 1853: John Russell Hind
- 1854: Charles Rümker
- 1855: William Rutter Dawes
- 1856: Robert Grant
- 1857: Samuel Heinrich Schwabe
- 1858: Rev. Robert Main
- 1859: Richard Christopher Carrington
- 1860: Peter Andreas Hansen
- 1861: Hermann Mayer Salomon Goldschmidt
- 1862: Warren De La Rue
- 1863: Friedrich Wilhelm August Argelander
- 1865: George Phillips Bond
- 1866: John Couch Adams
- 1867: William Huggins , William Allen Miller
- 1868: Urbain Le Verrier
- 1869: Edward James Stone
- 1870: Charles Eugène Delaunay
- 1872: Giovanni Schiaparelli
- 1874: Simon Newcomb
- 1875: Heinrich Louis d'Arrest
- 1876: Urbain Le Verrier
- 1878: Baron Ercole Dembowski
- 1879: Asaph Hall
- 1881: Axel Möller
- 1882: David Gill
- 1883: Benjamin Apthorp Gould
- 1884: Andrew Ainslie Common
- 1885: William Huggins
- 1886: Edward Charles Pickering , Charles Pritchard
- 1887: George William Hill
- 1888: Arthur Auwers
- 1889: Maurice Loewy
- 1892: George Howard Darwin
- 1893: Hermann Carl Vogel
- 1894: Sherburne Wesley Burnham
- 1895: Isaac Roberts
- 1896: Seth Carlo Chandler
- 1897: Edward Barnard
- 1898: William Frederick Denning
- 1899: Frank McClean
- 1900: Henri Poincaré
- 1901: Edward Charles Pickering
- 1902: Jacobus C. Kapteyn
- 1903: Hermann von Struve
- 1904: George Ellery Hale
- 1905: Lewis Boss
- 1906: William Wallace Campbell
- 1907: Ernest William Brown
- 1908: Sir David Gill
- 1909: Oskar Backlund
- 1910: Karl Friedrich Küstner
- 1911: Philip Herbert Cowell
- 1912: Arthur Robert Hinks
- 1913: Henri-Alexandre Deslandres
- 1914: Max Wolf
- 1915: Alfred Fowler
- 1916: Johan Ludvig Emil Dreyer
- 1917: Walter Sydney Adams
- 1918: John Evershed
- 1919: Guillaume Bigourdan
- 1921: Henry Norris Russell
- 1922: James Jeans
- 1923: Albert A. Michelson
- 1924: Arthur Stanley Eddington
- 1925: Sir Frank Dyson
- 1926: Albert Einstein
- 1927: Frank Schlesinger
- 1928: Ralph Allen Sampson
- 1929: Ejnar Hertzsprung
- 1930: John Stanley Plaskett
- 1931: Willem de Sitter
- 1932: Robert Grant Aitken
- 1933: Vesto Slipher
- 1934: Harlow Shapley
- 1935: Edward Arthur Milne
- 1936: Hisashi Kimura
- 1937: Harold Jeffreys
- 1938: William Hammond Wright
- 1939: Bernard Ferdinand Lyot
- 1940: Edwin Hubble
- 1943: Harold Spencer Jones
- 1944: Otto von Struve
- 1945: Bengt Edlén
- 1946: Jan Hendrik Oort
- 1947: Marcel Minnaert
- 1948: Bertil Lindblad
- 1949: Sydney Chapman
- 1950: Joel Stebbins
- 1951: Anton Pannekoek
- 1952: John Jackson
- 1953: Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
- 1954: Walter Baade
- 1955: Dirk Brouwer
- 1956: Thomas George Cowling
- 1957: Albrecht Unsöld
- 1958: André Danjon
- 1959: Raymond Arthur Lyttleton
- 1960: Viktor Hambardsumjan
- 1961: Herman Zanstra
- 1962: Bengt Strömgren
- 1963: Harry Hemley Plaskett (1893–1980)
- 1964: Martin Ryle , Maurice Ewing
- 1965: Edward C. Bullard , Gerald Maurice Clemence
- 1966: Ira S. Bowen , Harold C. Urey
- 1967: Hannes Alfvén , Allan Rex Sandage
- 1968: Sir Fred Hoyle , Walter Munk
- 1969: Albert Thomas Price , Martin Schwarzschild
- 1970: Horace Welcome Babcock
- 1971: Frank Press , Sir Richard van der Riet Woolley
- 1972: HIS Thirlaway , Fritz Zwicky
- 1973: Albert Francis Birch , Edwin Salpeter
- 1974: Ludwig Biermann , Keith Edward Bullen
- 1975: Jesse Leonard Greenstein , Ernst Öpik
- 1976: William McCrea , John Ashworth Ratcliffe
- 1977: DR Bates , John Gatenby Bolton
- 1978: Lyman Spitzer , James Van Allen
- 1979: Leon Knopoff , Charles Gorrie Wynne
- 1980: Chaim L. Pekeris , Maarten Schmidt
- 1981: J. Freeman Gilbert , Sir Bernard Lovell
- 1982: Riccardo Giacconi , Sir Harrie Massey
- 1983: Michael J. Seaton , Fred Whipple
- 1984: Keith Runcorn , Jakow Borissowitsch Seldowitsch
- 1985: Thomas Gold , Stephen Hawking
- 1986: George E. Backus , Alexander Dalgarno
- 1987: Takesi Nagata , Martin Rees
- 1988: Don L. Anderson , Cornelis de Jager
- 1989: Raymond Hide , Ken Pounds
- 1990: James Dungey , Bernard Pagel
- 1991: Witali Lasarewitsch Ginsburg , Gerald Joseph Wasserburg
- 1992: Dan McKenzie , Eugene N. Parker
- 1993: Peter Goldreich , Donald Lynden-Bell
- 1994: James E. Gunn , Thomas R. Kaiser
- 1995: John Houghton , Rashid Sunyaev
- 1996: K. Creer , Vera Rubin
- 1997: Donald T. Farley , Donald Edward Osterbrock
- 1998: RL Parker , James Peebles
- 1999: Kenneth Budden , Bohdan Paczyński
- 2000: Leon Lucy , Robert Hutchison
- 2001: Hermann Bondi , Henry Rishbeth
- 2002: Leon Mestel , John Arthur Jacobs
- 2003: John N. Bahcall , David Gubbins
- 2004: Jeremiah P. Ostriker , Grenville Turner
- 2005: Margaret Burbidge , Geoffrey Burbidge , Carole Jordan
- 2006: Simon White , SWH Cowley
- 2007: J. Leonard Culhane , Nigel Weiss
- 2008: Joseph Silk , Brian Kennett
- 2009: David Williams , Eric Priest
- 2010: Douglas Gough , John Woodhouse
- 2011: Richard Ellis , Eberhard Grün
- 2012: Andrew Fabian , John Brown
- 2013: Roger Blandford , Chris Chapman
- 2014: Carlos Frenk , John Zarnecki
- 2015: Michel Mayor , Mike Lockwood
- 2016: John D. Barrow , Philip England
- 2017: Nicholas Kaiser , Michele Dougherty
- 2018: James Hough , Robert White
- 2019: Margaret Kivelson , Robert Kennicutt
- 2020: Sandra Moore Faber , Yvonne Elsworth
Silver medals
Silver medals were also awarded on two occasions. However, this was not continued.
- 1824: Charles Rümker , Jean-Louis Pons
- 1827: William Samuel Stratford , Col. Mark Beaufoy
Acknowledgment medals from 1848
- George Biddell Airy , John Couch Adams , Friedrich Wilhelm August Argelander , George Bishop , Lt-Col. George Everest , Sir John Herschel , Peter Andreas Hansen , Karl Ludwig Hencke , John Russell Hind , Urbain Le Verrier , Sir John William Lubbock , Maximilian Weisse
Web links
- Gold Medal and Medalists (PDF, 432 kB)
- ↑ Leading astronomers and geophysicists honored in RAS bicentenary year. In: ras.ac.uk. Royal Astronomical Society, January 10, 2020, accessed January 11, 2020 .