Buys Ballot Medal

Sir Brian Hoskins

The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences will present the 2014 Buys Ballot Medal to British meteorologist Sir Brian Hoskins. A mathematician by training, Hoskins is receiving the medal for his pioneering work on weather systems and large-scale atmospheric motion.

About the laureate

Sir Brian J. Hoskins (born in 1945) has introduced numerous concepts and methods in operational meteorology that are now used worldwide to calculate weather forecasts. Thanks to his efforts, the Department of Meteorology at the University of Reading has achieved a leading international position.

Hoskins has already received many awards for his work and is regarded as one of the world's foremost meteorologists. He was knighted in 2007 for his services to the environment.

Sir Brian Hoskins received his PhD from the University of Cambridge in 1970. He has been with the Department of Meteorology at the University of Reading since 1976, first as a Reader in Atmospheric Modelling and since 1981 as Professor of Meteorology. From 2000 to 2010, he was a Royal Society Research Professor. In addition to his professorship at the University of Reading, in 2008 he became the first Director of the Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College London.

Edward Norton Lorenz

The American meteorologist Edward Norton Lorenz was awarded the Buys Ballot Medal 2004 by the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.

The Royal Netherlands Academy is awarding the medal to Lorenz for his contribution to the science of weather and climate forecasting.

Lorenz, the founder of chaos theory, discovered that a small disturbance of the atmosphere in one location can have major consequences for the weather in another. In his own famous example, the 'Butterfly Effect', he described how the beating of a butterfly's wings in China can unleash a tornado in America. Chaos theory has had an important impact on the method currently used by meteorologists to forecast the weather over several days and is now used on a daily basis to draw up medium to long term forecasts. It has influenced not only meteorology, but also biology, medicine and even the social sciences.

About the laureate

Edward Norton Lorenz (1917 - 2008 ) started out as a mathematician. His career in meteorology began during the Second World War, when he became a weather forecaster for the U.S. Army Air Corps. He went on to study meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he took his Ph.D. and was appointed a professor. Lorenz retired in 1987 but has continued to study the atmosphere.

1995

V. Ramanathan, United States

1982

Axel Wiin-Nielsen, Denmark

1973

Joseph Smagorinsky, United States

1963

Eric Palmén, Finland

1953

Gustav Swoboda, Czech Republic

1948

Sverre Petterssen, Norway

1943-

1933

Vilhelm Bjerknes, Norway

1923

Sir Napier Shaw, United Kingdom

1913

Hugo von Hergesell, Germany

1903

W. Assman / F.A. Berson, Germany

1893

Julius von Hann, Austria