Recipients

2023

Niels Kjærgaard for fundamental scientific studies on atomic collisions and light scattering using ultracold gases.

2022

Murray Cox for major advances in population genetic theory and the innovative development of associated computational methods that have delivered deep insight into genome evolution. 

2021

Eric Le Ru for his world-leading research in analytical chemistry at the nanoscale using surface-enhanced spectroscopies.

2020

Eamonn O’Brien for world-leading contributions to the mathematical theory of groups, both through theoretical breakthroughs and his powerful algorithms.

2019

Jadranka Travas-Sejdic for her outstanding contributions to the field of advanced polymeric and nanomaterials and their applications in biosensing, biomedicine and bioelectronics.

2018

Matt Visser for his internationally recognised research on black holes, cosmology, quantum physics, and "analogue spacetimes".

2017

Sally Brooker for designing and making molecules with exceptional properties such as the ability to act like a switch or magnet or to accelerate chemical reactions. Some of these molecules may contribute to a ‘greener’ future, allowing creation of compostable plastics or even the production of hydrogen from light energy, which would be the ultimate ‘green’ fuel.

2016

Stéphane Coen for outstanding contributions in understanding, generation, and manipulation of temporal cavity solitons, and in identifying their role in microresonator Kerr frequency combs

2015

Ian Brown for his innovative transformation of fundamental materials science into major technology platforms of strategic and commercial significance in New Zealand

2014

Marston Conder for his outstanding contribution to mathematics

2013

Richard Blaikie for his fundamental and wide-ranging contributions to the field of nano-optics

2012

Margaret Brimble for her sustained outstanding research in the field of organic chemistry, notably her impressive research in the field of natural products synthesis and the development of new synthetic methodology.

2011

Rod Downey for his influential and innovative work in mathematical logic.

2010

Grant Williams (or his internationally recognised work on the chemical and electronic structure of materials.

2009

Peter Steel (for his world renowned work in the field of metallosupramolecular chemistry leading to potential applications in medicine and nanotechnology)

2008

Gaven John Martin for deep and wide-ranging contributions to the theory of Kleinian groups, geometric function theory, and other fundamental parts of modern mathematics

2007

Timothy George Haskell

2006

Richard Furneaux for his outstanding contribution to the advancement of carbohydrate chemistry and to world-wide recognition of chemistry and pharmacology in New Zealand

2005

Ian Hugh Witten for major contributions to many areas of computer science

2003

Kenneth John Dallas MacKenzie for his contribution as a world leader in the physics and chemistry of ceramics, minerals and inorganics

2001

Peter Adolf Schwerdtfeger for his outstanding research in theoretical chemistry

2000

No award

1999

George Arthur Frederick Seber for fundamental contributions to statistical theory

1998

Paul Terence Callaghan for developing several ingenious and innovative applications of nuclear magnetic resonance imaging in many areas of physical and biological sciences

1998

Jeffery Lewis Tallon for his work on the physical understanding and practical importance of certain phase transitions in condensed matter

1997

Edward Neill Baker for sustained scientific innovation and leadership in the field of protein crystallography

1996

John Charles Butcher

1995

Robert Dudley Jolly

1994

Geoffrey Ernest Stedman

1993

Richard Irving Walcott

1992

Roger Curtis Green

1991

Warren Richard Roper

1990

Peter Wardle

1989

Patricia Rose Bergquist

1988

Daniel Frank Walls

1987

Albert James Ellis

1986

Robin Wayne Carrell

1985

Peter Bernard David de la Mare

1984

Roderick Leon Bieleski

1983

Raymond Robert Forster

1982

Roy Patrick Kerr

1981

Trevor Hatherton

1980

Graham Collingwood Liggins

1979

Leon Francis Phillips

1978

Richard Ellis Ford Matthews

1977

Campbell Stuart Wemyss Reid

1976

John Newton Dodd

1975

Robert Cecil Hayes

1974

Herbert Dudley Purves

1973

Michael Philip Hartshorn

1972

Edward George Bollard

1971

Ira James Cunningham

1970

Brian Garner Wybourne

1969

Douglas Saxon Coombs

1968

Gilbert Edward Archey

1967

Richard Conrad Cambie

1966

John Thorpe Holloway

1965

Richard Kenneth Dell

1964

Derek Frank Lawden

1963

Charles Alexander Fleming

1962

Ralph O’Reilly Piddington

1961

Harry Bloom

1960

Edward Edinborough Chamberlain

1959

Howard Barraclough Fell

1958

Alister George McLellan

1957

Harold William Wellman

1956

Roger Shepherd Duff

1955

Francis Brian Shorland

1954

Lucy May Cranwell Smith

1953

Lancelot Eric Richdale

1952

Keith Edward Bullen

1951

Francis John Turner

1950

Ernest Beaglehole

1949

Robert Anthony Robinson

1948

Gordon Herriot Cunningham

1947

Arthur William Baden Powell

1946

Henry George Forder

1945

John Henderson

1944

Johannes Carl Andersen

1943

Lindsay Heathcote Briggs

1942

Harry Howard Allan

1941

Harold John Finlay

1940

Donald Bannerman Macleod

1939

John Arthur Bartrum

1938

Herbert William Williams

1937

John Reader Hosking

1936

Walter Reginald Brook Oliver

1935

William Blaxland Benham

1934

Charles Ernest Weatherburn

1933

John Marwick 
William Noel Benson

1932

Te Rangi Hiroa (Peter H. Buck)

1931

William Percival Evans

1930

John Ernest Holloway

1929

George Malcolm Thomson

1928

Duncan M’Laren Young Sommerville

1927

Charles Andrew Cotton

1926

Henry Devenish Skinner

1925

Bernard Cracroft Aston

1924

Donald Petrie

1923

George Vernon Hudson

1922

Clinton Coleridge Farr

1921

Robert Speight

1920

Stephenson Percy Smith

1919

Philip Wilfred Robertson

1918

Thomas Frederic Cheeseman

1917

Charles Chilton

1916

Ernest Rutherford

1915

Patrick Marshall

1914

Elsdon Best

1913

Thomas Hill Easterfield

1912

Leonard Cockayne