Demidov Prize

Pavel Nikolaievich Demidov, the founder of the prize

The Demidov Prize (Russian: Демидовская премия) is a national scientific prize in the Russian Empire awarded annually to the members of the Russian Academy of Sciences. One of the most prestigious and oldest scientific awards in the world, its traditions influenced other awards of this kind including the Nobel Prize. The Demidov Prize was restored by the government of the Sverdlovsk Oblast in 1993.

History

In 1831 Pavel Nikolaevich Demidov, representative of the famous Demidov family, established a scientific prize in his name. The Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences (now the Russian Academy of Sciences) was chosen as the awarding institution. In 1832 the president of the Petersburg Academy of Sciences, Sergei Uvarov, awarded the first prizes.

From 1832 to 1866 the Academy awarded 55 full prizes (5,000 rubles) and 220 part prizes. Among the winners were many prominent Russian scientists: the founder of field surgery and inventor of the plaster immobilisation method in treatment of fractures, Nikolai Pirogov; the seafarer and geographer Adam Johann von Krusenstern; the creator of the periodic table of elements, Dmitri Mendeleev; the inventor of the electric engine, Boris Yakobi; and many others.

From 1866, 25 years after Pavel Demidov's death and according to the terms of his bequest, there were no more awards.

In 1993, on the initiative of the vice-president of the Russian Academy of Sciences Gennady Mesyats and the governor of the Sverdlovsk Oblast Eduard Rossel, the Demidov Prize traditions were restored. The prize is awarded for outstanding achievements in natural sciences and humanities. The winners are elected annually among the members of the Russian Academy of Sciences. According to the tradition every year the Demidov Scientific Foundation chooses three or four academicians to receive the award. The prize includes a medal, a diploma and $10,000. The awards ceremony takes place every year at the Governor's Palace of Sverdlovsk Oblast, in Yekaterinburg, Russia. The recipients of the Prize also give lectures at the Ural State University (Demidov Lecture).

Winners

Year	Portrait	Recipient(s)	Field(s)	Ref
1832		Magnus Georg Paucker	Physics	[1]
1832		Yulii Gagemeyster	Economics	[1]
1833		Aleksandr Vostokov	Philology	[1]
1833		Filipp Reyf	Philology	[1]
1835		Fydor Sidonskiy	Philosophy	[1]
1835		Nikita Bichurin	History	[1]
1835		Pyotr Sokolov	Philology	[1]
1836		Fyodor Litke	Geography	[1]
1836		Nikolai Brashman	Mathematics	[1]
1836	´	Alexander Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky	History	[1]
1837		Ivan Kruzenshtern	Geography	[1]
1837		Friedrich Wilhelm Argelander	Astronomy	[1]
1837		Nikolay Ustryalov	History	[1]
1838		Stanislav Shoduar	History	[1]
1839		Nikita Bichurin	Philology	[1]
1839		Alexander Kazembek	Philology	[1]
1839		Nikolay Medem	Military sciences	[1]
1840		Mikhail Pogodin	Philology	[1]
1840		David Chubinashvili	Philology	[1]
1840		Boris Yakobi	Physics	[1]
1841		Alexander Postels	Biology	[1]
1840		Franz Josef Ruprecht	Biology	[1]
1842		Ferdinand von Wrangel	Geography	[1]
1844		Aleksandr Vostokov	Philology	[1]
1844		Gerasim Pavsky	Philology	[1]
1844		Nikolai Pirogov	Medicine	[1]
1845		Friedrich von Adelung	Geography	[1]
1846		Aleksey Savich	Astronomy	[1]
1846		Osip Kovalevsky	Philology	[1]
1846		Karl Ernst Claus	Chemistry	[1]
1847		Alexander Keyserling	Geography	[1]
1847		Pavel Kruzenshtern	Geography	[1]
1847		Anatoly Demidov	Geography	[1]
1847		Dmitry Tolstoy	History	[1]
1847		David Chubinashvili	Philology	[1]
1848		Johan Jakob Nervander	Meteorology	[1]
1849		Pafnuty Chebyshev	Mathematics	[1]
1850		Fyodor Goremykin	Military sciences	[1]
1851		Nikolai Pirogov	Medicine	[1]
1851		Mikhail Reyneke	Geography	[1]
1852		Konstantin Nevolin	History	[1]
1852		Loggin Zeddeler	Military sciences	[1]
1853		Dmitry Milyutin	History	[1]
1854		Mikhail Bulgakov	Theology	[1]
1854		Konstantin Nevolin	History	[1]
1855		Dmitrii Ivanovich Zhuravskii	Technical sciences	[1]
1857		Nikolai Turchaninov	Biology	[1]
1857		Heinz Christian Pander	Geography	[1]
1858		Iosif Goshkevich	Philology	[1]
1859		Karl Maximovich	Biology	[1]
1860		Nikolai Pirogov	Medicine	[1]
1860		Fyodor Dmitriyev	Law	[1]
1861		Pyotr Pekarsky	Philology	[1]
1861		Modest Bogdanovich	History	[1]
1862		Modest Korf	History	[1]
1862		Dmitri Mendeleev	Chemistry	[1]
1863		Grigory Butakov	Maritime sciences	[1]
1865		Fyodor Smit	History	[1]
1865		Lyudvig Shwarts	Geodesy	[1]
Not awarded from 1866 till 1992
1993		Sergei Vonsovsky	Physics	[1]
1993		Nikolay Kochetkov	Chemistry	[1]
1993		Boris Chesnokov	Geology	[1]
1993		Valentin Yanin	History	[1]
1993		Anatoly Karpov	Economics	[1]
1994		Boris Rauschenbach	Mechanics	[1]
1994		Aleksandr Bayev	Biology	[1]
1994		Pyotr Kropotkin	Geology	[1]
1994		Nikita Tolstoy	Philology	[1]
1995		Andrey Gaponov-Grekhov	Physics	[1]
1995		Genrich Tolstikov	Chemistry	[1]
1995		Vladimir Magnitsky	Geophysics	[1]
1995		Nikolay Pokrovsky	History	[1]
1996		Nikolai Krasovsky	Mathematics and mechanics	[1]
1996		Vladimir Sokolov	Biology	[1]
1996		Georgy Golitsyn	Earth sciences	[1]
1996		Yevgeni Chelyshev	Philology	[1]
1997		Alexander Skrinsky	Physics	[1]
1997		Nikolay Vatolin	Chemistry	[1]
1997		Nikolay Laverov	Earth sciences	[1]
1997		Andrey Zaliznyak	Linguistics	[1]
1998		Oleg Gazenko	Biology	[1]
1998		Andre Gonchar	Mathematics	[1]
1998		Valentin Sedov	History	[1]
1998		Nikolay Yushkin	Earth sciences	[1]
1999		Zhores Alferov	Physics	[1]
1999		Nikolay Dobretsov	Earth sciences	[1]
1999		Vladimir Tartakovsky	Chemistry	[1]
2000		Victor Maslov	Mathematics	[1]
2000		Nikolay Semikhatov	Mechanics	[1]
2000		Rem Petrov	Earth sciences	[1]
2000		Tatyana Zaslavskaya	Economics and sociology	[1]
2001		Aleksandr Prokhorov	Physics	[1]
2001		Viktor Kabanov	Chemistry	[1]
2001		Igor Gramberg	Earth sciences	[1]
2002		Ludvig Faddeev	Mathematics	[1]
2002		Viktor Savelyev	Medicine	[1]
2002		Vladimir Kudryavtsev	Law	[1]
2002		Gennady Mesyats	Physics	[1]
2003		Boris Litvinov	Physics	[1]
2003		Irina Beletskaya	Chemistry	[1]
2003		Oleg Bogatikov	Earth sciences	[1]
2004		Gury Marchuk	Mathematics	[1]
2004		Vladimir Bolshakov	Biology	[1]
2004		Anatoly Derevyanko	History and archeology	[1]
2005		Oleg Krokhin	Physics	[1]
2005		Nikolay Lyakishev	Physicochemistry	[1]
2002		Aleksey Kontorovich	Earth sciences	[1]
2006		Timur Eneev	Mathematics	[1]
2006		Veniamin Alekseyev	History	[1]
2006		Vladimir Kulakov	Medicine	[1]
2007		Boris Kovalchuk	Physics	[1]
2007		Oleg Chupakhin	Chemistry	[1]
2007		Mikhail Kuzmin	Earth science	[1]
2008		Evgeny Mischenko	Mathematics	[1]
2008		Anatoly Grigoriev	Medicine	[1]
2008		Valery Makarov	Economics	[1]
2009		Yuri Kagan	Physics	[1]
2009		Dmitry Rundkvist	Earth science	[1]
2009		Yuri Tretyakov	Chemistry	[1]
2009		Alexey Olovnikov	Biology	[1]
2010		Yury Osipov	Mathematics	[1]
2010		Gennady Sakovich	Chemistry	[1]
2010		Sergei Alekseev	Humanities	[1]
2011		Alexander Andreev	Physics	[1]
2011		Yuriy Zhuravlyov	Biology	[1]
2011		Vladimir Kotlyakov	Earth science	[1]
2012		Yevgeny Primakov	Social science	[2]
2012		Ilya Moiseev	Chemistry	[2]
2012		Eugeny Avrorin	Physics	[2]

References

Bibliography

• (in Russian) N. A. Mezenin: Лауреаты Демидовских премий Петербургской Академии наук. Л., Наука, 1987.
• (in Russian) Yuri Alexandrovich Sokolov, Zoya Antonovna Bessudnova, L. T. Prizhdetskaya: Отечественные действительные и почетные члены Российской академии наук 18-20 вв. Геология и горные науки.- М.: Научный мир, 2000.

External links

• Demidov Foundation short history
• List of all the winners of the full Demidov Prize
• Demidov Prize and Demidov Lecturing at Lebedev Physical Institute web site