Former Ames Center Director Hans Mark initiated the award in honor of H. Julian Allen. Dr. Allen published prolifically, and encouraged others to publish as well. More importantly, Dr. Allen valued the sort of out-of-the-box thinking that made Ames famous as a research institution able to solve the nation’s most pressing and seemingly intractable aerospace challenges.

Nomination Process:

The Ames Chief Scientist shall put forth a Center-wide call for nominations for the H. Julian Allen Award. Only Ames Research Center (ARC) staff may nominate another civil servant who is the author of a scientific or engineering paper of outstanding significance for recognition. All nominations must be submitted to the Office of the Chief Scientist (OCS), which shall arrange a peer-review committee to evaluate the technical and scientific merit of the paper.

All nominations must be made by someone other than the authors and should be routed through division offices. Each nomination must be accompanied by the following information:

1. A copy of the nominated paper;
2. A succinct memorandum containing:
   1. Statement of importance of problem addressed by the paper;
   2. Degree to which the paper contributes to solving the problem;
   3. Description of key innovative contributions of the paper;
   4. Impact of paper on general field of research;
   5. Degree of contributions by each author;
   6. Supporting background material;
3. Two letters of support from outside of Ames that assess the impact of the work in its field of study.

Eligibility:

To be eligible to receive the H. Julian Allen Award, nominees must meet the following criteria:

1. Be a current civil servant at ARC;
2. Be the senior author of the paper;
3. The majority of the work must have been done at ARC;
4. Nominated paper must be at least 2-3 years old and have measurable impact;
5. The paper must have passed through a peer-review.

Selection:

One H. Julian Allen Award will be granted per fiscal year. The OCS shall review all nominations and provide input to the Center Director who will make the final selection. Awardees will receive the following:

1. A $10,000 honorarium;
2. A plaque.

Awardees will also be required to give a lecture to the Center.

If you have any questions regarding the H. Julian Allen Award nomination process, eligibility, or selection, you may contact the OCS at jacob.cohen-1@nasa.gov.

2021 H. Julian Allen Award Winner:

The 2021 H. Julian Allen Award is awarded to Dr. Viktor Stolc for the paper, “Global Identification of Human Transcribed Sequences with Genome Tiling Arrays” by Bertone, P., Stolc, V., Royce, T.E., Rozowsky, J.S., Urban, A.E., Zhu, X., Rinn, J.L., Tongprasit, W., Samanta, M., Weissman, S., Gerstein, M. and Snyder, M., published in Science 306: 2242-2246 (2004).

Past H. Julian Allen Award Winners:

2019

• David Blake – Characterization and calibration of the CheMin mineralogical instrument on Mars Science Laboratory

2018

• Jack J. Lissauer – A closely packed system of low-mass, low-density planets transiting Kepler-11

2017

• Tori Hoehler – Microbial life under extreme energy limitation

2016

• Anthony Colaprete – Detection of Water in the LCROSS Ejecta Plume

2014

• Jack J. Lissauer – Models of Jupiter’s growth incorporating thermal and hydrodynamic constraints

2012

• Jing Li and and Meyya Meyyappan – Carbon Nanotube Sensors for Gas and Organic Vapor Detection

2011

• Andrew S. Ackerman and Mark S. Marley – Precipitating Condensation Clouds in Substellar Atmospheres

2010

• Eric Darve and Andrew Pohorille – Calculating Free Energies Using Average Force

For more information regarding the H. Julian Allen Award, visit the Ames History Office at http://history.arc.nasa.gov/awards_hjallen.htm