Institute of Physics Awards


The Institute of Physics awards numerous prizes to acknowledge contributions to physics research, education and applications. It also offers smaller specific subject-group prizes, such as for PhD thesis submissions.
WWW iop.org/about/awards

Bilateral awards

Business awards

Education awards

The [Lawrence Bragg] Medal and Prize

First awarded in 1967, is a gold medal for outstanding and sustained contributions to physics education. Previous winners are:

The [Marie Curie-Sklodowska] Medal and Prize

Established in 2016, is awarded for "distinguished contributions to physics education and to widening participation within it."

The [Daphne Jackson] Medal and Prize

Established in 2016, is awarded "for exceptional early career contributions to physics education and to widening participation within it."

The Teacher of Physics Award

Since 1986, celebrates the success of secondary school physics teachers who have raised the profile of physics and science in schools.

The Technician Award

To recognise the experience of technicians and their contribution to physics

The Goronwy Jones prize

Awarded to the top-scoring A-level candidate in Physics in Wales.

Outreach awards

  • The Kelvin Medal and Prize is a gold medal instigated in October 1994 in recognition of the importance of promoting public awareness of the place of physics in the world, of its contributions to the quality of life and its advancement of an understanding of the physical world and the place of humanity within it.
  • The Lise Meitner Medal and Prize, established in 2016, is awarded for "distinguished contributions to public engagement within physics."
  • The Mary Somerville Medal and Prize

Research awards

Service to the IOP awards

  • The President's Medal can be given to both physicists and non-physicists who have provided meritorious services in various fields of endeavour which were of benefit to physics in general and the Institute in particular.
  • The Phillips Award is awarded for distinguished service to the Institute of Physics.

Special Interest Group Prizes and Awards

Many of the Institute's special interest groups—sub-groups of the organisations members working in, or with an interest in, a specific area or sub-discipline—award prizes, typically annually. These include:
  • The IOP Astroparticle Physics Group Early Career Prize, awarded on odd-numbered years to early-career researchers working at an institution in the UK and Ireland in the area of astroparticle physics who 'have five years or less postdoctoral experience '.
  • The John Chubb Award, from the Dielectrics and Electrostatics Group for 'outstanding contributions to experimental electrostatics by early career researchers'.
  • The Mansel Davies Award from the Dielectrics and Electrostatics Group is for 'outstanding contributions to dielectrics by early career researchers'.
  • The High Energy Particle Physics Group Prize, awarded to 'an early career researcher for outstanding contributions to particle physics research'.
  • The Liquids and Complex Fluids Early Career Award, 'given biennially to an exceptional scientist, in the early stages of their career, working in the broadly defined area of Liquids and Complex Fluids'.
  • The Wohlfarth Lectureship, jointly sponsored by the Magnetism Group and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Magnetics Society UK and Ireland Magnetics Chapter, which 'recognises the outstanding contribution made by Professor Peter Wohlfarth to the field of magnetism'.