Celebrating innovation in young scientists in North America and Latin America

Oxford Instruments NanoScience has been proudly presenting the Lee Osheroff Richardson (LOR) Science Prize for North America and Latin America for 16 years. The LOR Science Prize promotes and recognises the novel work of young scientists working in low temperatures and/or high magnetic fields in the Americas.

For many young scientists, the critical stage between completing their PhD and gaining a permanent research position can be difficult. Oxford Instruments seek to help individuals who are producing innovative work in low temperature and/or high magnetic fields and support them in this period of career definement. Through the LOR Science Prize, we are able to assist these scientists, both by financially contributing to their research and promoting it throughout this prestigious award.

All candidates should be nominated by a senior member of their department or Institute. The winner is chosen by the prize selection committee comprising leading physicists from North America and Latin America.

The winner of the LOR Science Prize for North America and Latin America will receive:

• 8,000 dollars cash prize
• A certificate and trophy
• Support to attend the next APS March Meeting, where the winner is will be presented with the prize at a specially held event by Oxford Instruments 'Socialize with Science'

LOR Science Prize 2021 Winner

We are delighted to announce that Dr. Matthew Yankowitz of the University of Washington has been selected as the winner of the 2021 Lee Osheroff Richardson (LOR) Science Prize. Dr. Matthew Yankowitz is recognised for his formative contributions to the field of moiré van der Waals heterostructures, spanning the initial discovery of band reconstruction in aligned graphene/boron nitride to more recent investigations of strongly correlated states, magnetism, topology and superconductivity in twisted graphene structures.

Dr. Matthew Yankowitz

“I am thrilled and honored to have been selected as the recipient of the prestigious Lee Osheroff Richardson Science Prize for 2021. Although our primary goal is to uncover new fundamental physics, gaining industry recognition is an important part of the work that we do. I’m grateful for all of the support from my phenomenal colleagues and mentors that has enabled me to reach this point” 

Lee Osheroff Richardson

The Lee Osheroff Richardson Science Prize for North America and Latin America is named after David M. Lee, Douglas D. Osheroff and Robert C. Richardson who were joint winners of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1996, for their discovery of superfluidity in 3He.

They conducted the Nobel prize winning research in the early 1970's in the low temperature laboratory at Cornell University using apparatus they had built to produce sample temperatures within a few thousandths of a degree of absolute zero. Their findings proved that the helium isotope 3He can be made superfluid at a temperature only about two thousandths of a degree above absolute zero. The discovery initiated intensive research on the special characteristics of the new quantum liquid. Lee, Osheroff and Richardson have also received, among other awards, the Sir Francis Simon Memorial Prize 1976 (Institute of Physics UK), and the Oliver E. Buckley Solid State Physics Prize 1980 (American Physical Society); for the discovery of superfluidity in 3He.

Oxford Instruments would like to thank David M. Lee, Douglas D. Osheroff and Robert C. Richardson for permission to name the prize after them.