The Rumford Medal is an award bestowed by Britain's

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

every alternating year for "an outstandingly important recent discovery in the field of thermal or optical properties of matter made by a scientist working in Europe". First awarded during 1800, it was created after a 1796 donation of $5000 by the scientist

Benjamin Thompson Sir Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford, FRS (german: Reichsgraf von Rumford; March 26, 1753August 21, 1814) was an American-born British physicist and inventor whose challenges to established physical theory were part of the 19th-century revolut ...

, known as Count Rumford, and is accompanied by a gift of £1000. Since its inception, the award has been granted to 104 scientists, including Rumford himself during 1800. It has been awarded to citizens of the United Kingdom sixty-one times, France fourteen times, Germany eight times, the Netherlands seven times, Sweden four times, the United States three times, Italy twice and once each to citizens of

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Cr ...

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to ...

Luxembourg Luxembourg ( ; lb, Lëtzebuerg ; french: link=no, Luxembourg; german: link=no, Luxemburg), officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, ; french: link=no, Grand-Duché de Luxembourg ; german: link=no, Großherzogtum Luxemburg is a small lan ...

and

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island coun ...

List of recipients

References

General * Specific Notelist {{RoySoc 1796 establishments in Great Britain Biennial events Awards of the Royal Society

List of recipients

See also

References