Ernest Orlando Lawrence Award

Ernest Orlando Lawrence Award
Ernest Orlando Lawrence Certificate and Medal
Awarded for	Excellence in scientific, technical, or engineering achievements related to the missions of the U.S. Department of Energy
Sponsored by	Department of Energy's Office of Science
Country	United States
Presented by	Secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy
Reward(s)	$20,000
First awarded	1960 (1960)

The Ernest Orlando Lawrence Award was established in 1959 in honor of a scientist who helped elevate American physics to the status of world leader in the field.

E. O. Lawrence was the inventor of the cyclotron, an accelerator of subatomic particles, and a 1939 Nobel Laureate in physics for that achievement. The Radiation Laboratory he developed at Berkeley during the 1930s ushered in the era of “big science,” in which experiments were no longer done by an individual researcher and a few assistants on the table-top of an academic lab but by large, multidisciplinary teams of scientists and engineers in entire buildings full of sophisticated equipment and huge scientific machines. During World War II, Lawrence and his accelerators contributed to the Manhattan Project, and he later played a leading role in establishing the U.S. system of national laboratories, two of which (Lawrence Berkeley and Lawrence Livermore) now bear his name.

Shortly after Lawrence's death in August 1958, John A. McCone, Chairman of the United States Atomic Energy Commission, wrote to President Eisenhower suggesting the establishment of a memorial award in Lawrence's name. President Eisenhower agreed, saying, "Such an award would seem to me to be most fitting, both as a recognition of what he has given to our country and to mankind, and as a means of helping to carry forward his work through inspiring others to dedicate their lives and talents to scientific effort." The first Lawrence Awards were given in 1960.