The Russell Varian prize honors the memory of the pioneer behind the first commercial Nuclear Magnetic Resonance spectrometers and co-founder of Varian Associates. The prize is awarded to a researcher based on a single innovative contribution (a single paper, patent, lecture, or piece of hardware) that has proven of high and broad impact on state-of-the-art NMR technology. The prize aims to award the initial contribution that laid the ground for the specific technology of great importance in state-of-the-art NMR. It is sponsored by Varian Inc. and carries a monetary award of 15,000 Euro. The award ceremony will take place at the EUROMAR 2011 meeting in Frankfurt, Germany, August 21-25, 2011, with the prize winner delivering the Russell Varian lecture.
Rules for the Russell Varian Prize
- Only single pieces of work are considered (a paper, a lecture, a patent, etc).
- In case of multiple authorship, the prize is awarded to the author with the largest creative and innovative share of the contribution. Only in exceptional cases of truly equal shares can the prize be split between two authors of the same contribution.
- No individual can receive the prize more than once.
- Prize winners become members of the Advisory Board for the Russell Varian Prize that evaluates future nominations and makes recommendations to the Prize Committee.
Call for Nominations
Nominations must be forwarded by email to the Secretary of the Prize Committee, Vladimir Sklenar. The deadline for nominations is February 21, 2011. Nominations should be laid out in the format of a publishable laudatio proposal that in case of multiple authorship must include an outline of why the nominee is the most innovative author behind the paper. Attention is further drawn to the fact that the Russell Varian prize awards the earliest seed paper of an important technology rather than later more comprehensive and highly quoted papers.
Prize Committee 2011: Christian Griesinger, Jean Jeener (Chairman), Eriks Kupce, Thomas Prisner (EUROMAR 2011 representative), Vladimir Sklenar (Secretary), and Ole W. Sørensen
Advisory Board for the Russell Varian Prize: Erwin Hahn, Nicolaas Bloembergen, John S. Waugh, Alfred G. Redfield, Alexander Pines, Albert W. Overhauser, Martin Karplus
Previous Russell Varian Prize Laureates, Jean Jeener (2002), Erwin Hahn (2004), Nicolaas Bloembergen (2005), John S. Waugh (2006), Alfred G. Redfield (2007), Alexander Pines (2008), Albert W. Overhauser (2009), Martin Karplus (2010).