The “Jürgen Ehlers thesis prize” and the “Bergmann-Wheeler thesis prize” of the International Society for General Relativity and Gravitation 2013

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The International Society for General Relativity and Gravitation awards two Ph.D. thesis prizes, one in classical gravity and one in quantum gravity. One prize in each category is awarded at each triennial GRG conference. The monetary value of each award is US $1,500. These prizes complement the Gravitational Wave thesis prize awarded by GWIC, for which the Society is the trustee of the funds.

The Jürgen Ehlers thesis prize is sponsored by Springer, publishers of the Society’s journal “General Relativity and Gravitation”, and will cover the areas of mathematical and numerical general relativity and gravitation in a broad sense. The Bergmann-Wheeler thesis prize is sponsored by the UK Institute of Physics, publishers of “Classical and Quantum Gravity”, and will encompass all approaches to quantum gravity.

The Society seeks nominations for both prizes for award in 2013. The deadline for receipt of the nomination packet is September 30th, 2012. The nominator must be a member of the Society. Nominators can make at most one nomination in each category. The nominee need not be a member of the Society but the official defense must have taken place between October 1, 2009 and September 30th, 2012. The nomination package will consist of:

i) A nomination letter summarizing the main results and their importance and elaborating the student’s role in case of joint work.

ii) A PDF file of the thesis, and of any supporting papers which formed an integral part of the thesis submission. (For any such paper, reference to a readily available public source is acceptable instead.)

iii) A CV and the publication list of the nominee.

iv) An official University document showing the date of the successful Ph.D. defense. (This can be sent later, if not available by September 30th, 2012.)

v) One or two optional letters in support from experts. At least one of these is required if the nominator is a supervisor of the Ph.D. thesis.

The primary criteria for selection will be the high quality of scientific results, creativity and originality, and the significance of results for the broad area of the prize. The winner for each prize will be chosen by a committee of leading international experts in the field approximately six months before the GR20 conference which will be held in Warsaw on 8-12 July 2013. This will provide the winners ample time to plan travel to the conference. The prize is conditional to the winner attending the conference (the Executive committee of the GRG Society may allow the prize to be given in absentia in exceptional cases.)

Nominations for the Bergman-Wheeler prize should be submitted electronically, possibly packaged in a single email, to the address gravity[AT]cpt.univ-mrs.fr.  If it is not possible to send a nomination in electronic form, please send 4 hard copies to Carlo Rovelli, CPT-CNRS, Case 907, av. de Luminy, F-13288, Marseille Cedex 9, France.

Nominations for the Ehlers prize should be submitted electronically to Bernd Brügmann, c/o Renate Wagner Renate.Wagner[AT]uni-jena.de.  If it is not possible to send a nomination in electronic form, please send 4 hard copies to Renate Wagner, Theoretical Physics Institute, University of Jena, Max-Wien-Platz 1, 07743 Jena, Germany