Awards

Every year the NZMS hands out awards for mathematics research and contributions to mathematics in NZ.

NZMS Research Award

The 2024 NZMS Research Award went to Stephen Marsland

The NZMS Research Award was instituted in 1990 to foster mathematical excellence in research carried out by mathematicians in New Zealand.
Stephen Marsland with NZMS president Melissa Tacy

This Award is based on mathematical research published in the last five calendar years (2020-2025). This could include research published in books, journals, other peer-reviewed venues, or other types of high quality mathematical research.

Eligibility. To be eligible for the Award, a candidate must be a current member of the NZMS and must have been residing in New Zealand for the last three years.

The five year assessment period may be adjusted to take into account career breaks. Candidates may contact the NZMS President Prof Bernd Krauskopf in confidence for clarification of how the adjustment of time period applies to the their particular circumstances.

Nominations should include the following:

  • preferred name and affiliation of candidate;
  • statement of general area of research;
  • a CV including: distinctions awarded, full list of graduate students supervised, full list of grants received (including names of co-investigators), full list of
    publications (including names of coauthors); publications from the 2020-2025 assessment period should be highlighted;
  • if appropriate, a justification for an adjustment of the assessment period to take into account an interrupted career pattern;
  • if the candidate chooses, a short (no more than half page) statement detailing the effect of COVID related disruption on their research output;
  • an electronic copy (pdf) of each of the five most significant publications (selected from within the assessment period);
  • a clear statement of how much of any joint work is due to the candidate;
  • names of two persons willing to act as referees, though the judging panel may approach referees other than those nominated;
  • the referees should be chosen carefully; in particular, they should not have a conflict of interest and they should be able to give scientific insight into the work to
    be assessed. It may be easier to avoid a conflict of interest by choosing international referees; and
  • a citation, of maximum 40 words, summarizing the mathematical research underlying the application.

 

Unsuccessful applicants from 2024 will be invited to update their application so that it can be reconsidered in 2025.

Nominations should be sent by email to the NZMS President,   Bernd Krauskopf, by 31 August 2025. Submissions should state clearly that they are for the NZMS Research Award. Candidates may nominate themselves.

A judging panel will be appointed by the NZMS President, and the panel makes recommendations to the President for the Award. No person shall receive the Award more than once. The Award consists of a certificate including an appropriate citation of the awardee’s work, and will be announced and presented at the New Zealand Mathematics Colloquium Dinner in December.

The Research Award for 2024 was presented at the Joint Meeting of the NZMS, AustMS, and AMS to Stephen Marsland (Victoria University) “For his contributions to a wide variety of mathematical theory and applications, from the geometry of the diffeomorphism groups to geometric descriptions of bird calls and the use of this in estimation of population abundance”.

Recipients of the NZMS Research Award
Year Name Location Award Details
2023 Michael Plank For research in stochastic and nonlinear dynamical models that has led to new mathematical advances and novel insights into a range of application areas including cell biology, the dynamics and management of complex ecosystems, and epidemiological modelling.
2022 Noam Greenberg For contributions and significant advances in computability theory, proof theory, set theory, computable structure theory and algorithmic information theory.
2021 Clemency Montelle Professor Montelle pursues outstanding research in the field of the history of mathematics, employing the rare combination of fluency in ancient languages and an extensive background in mathematics to uncover hitherto unknown profound and diverse mathematical achievements of our predecessors.
2020 Jeroen Schillewaert For his outstanding and diverse contributions to a broad range of topics in combinatorics and finite geometry, combining techniques from extremal and probabilistic combinatorics, linear algebra, and group theory.
2019 David Simpson This award recognises David Simpson for combining algebra, analysis, combinatorics and traditional dynamical systems to make fundamental advances on the bifurcation theory of piecewise smooth differential equations and maps.
2018 Alex James This award recognises Alex James for her contributions in mathematical modelling ranging from the theoretical, such as Lévy walks and complex ecological systems, to the very applied, such as masting and snail dynamics.
2018 Carlo Laing This award recognises Carlo Laing for his sustained contributions to the field of mathematical neuroscience, and pioneering work in the study of coupled oscillator networks.
2017 Igor Klep This award recognises Igor Klep for deep and fundamental advances in real algebraic geometry and its application to diverse fields including operator theory, optimization, free analysis, convexity, and von Neumann algebras.
2016 David Bryant This award recognises David Bryant for work developing mathematical, statistical and computational tools for evolutionary biology, and work drawing on evolutionary biology to develop new theories in mathematics.
2016 Bernd Krauskopf This award recognises Bernd Krauskopf for outstanding contributions to dynamical systems, especially bifurcation theory and its application to diverse physical phenomena.
2015 Hinke Osinga This award recognises Hinke Osinga for pioneering work on theory and computational methods in dynamical systems and its applications in biology and engineering.
2014 Dimitri Leemans This award recognises Dimitri Leemans for his striking contributions to algebraic combinatorics that combine techniques from algebra, graph theory, combinatorics and number theory for the exploration and classification of highly symmetric geometric structures.
2013 Steven Galbraith This award recognises Steven Galbraith for applying deep ideas from number theory and algebraic geometry to Public Key Cryptography to achieve world leading processing speeds without compromising security.
2012 Ben Martin This award recognises Ben Martin's outstanding and broad contributions to algebra including the application of geometric invariant theory to algebraic groups, the geometry of spherical buildings, and the representation growth of groups.
2012 Tom ter Elst This award recognises Tom ter Elst for his deep and sustained contributions to the analysis and understanding of elliptic operators, and associated evolution processes.
2011 Shaun Cooper This award recognises Shaun's sustained generation of significant and original contributions to number theory, particularly in the areas of elliptic functions, theta functions, and modular forms.
2010 Charles Semple This award recognises Charles Semple’s landmark contributions to combinatorics, and in particular matroid theory, as well as leading work in phylogenetics and computational biology.
2009 André Nies This award recognises André Nies’s special creativity and highly influential contributions in the area of mathematical logic and in particular its application to questions of computability, complexity, and randomness.
2008 Mike Hendy For his innovative mathematical approach to molecular ecology and evolution which has transformed the field. His seminal work on the Hadamard transform—used to separate out pertinent signals in evolutionary data—is now an integral part of phylogenetic software internationally and has contributed to the solution of several fundamental problems
2007 Ernie Kalnins For his wide ranging, prolific and significant contributions to mathematics, especially in his research on symmetries of partial differential equations, separable coordinates and superintegrable systems.
2006 Robert Aldred For his leading work in Combinatorics and Graph Theory. In particular his near complete solution of the vertex colouring/edge partition problem, the characterisation of regular graphs which admit at most one 2-factor as well as his recent work on the Path Partition Conjecture from the early 80s by resolving (in the negative) a strong form of this conjecture.
2006 Mick Roberts For his pioneering and practical work in Mathematical Epidemiology, his development of realistic physiologically based models of the incidence and spread of infectious diseases and his work on parasite transmission on pasture, all of which has attracted international recognition.
2005 Robert McLachlan For creative, pioneering work leading to deep advances in the theory of geometric numerical integration, and its application in the study of dynamical systems.
2005 James Sneyd For extensive and celebrated contributions in mathematical biology, demonstrating approaches that combine originality with biological realism.
2004 Eamonn O'Brien For outstanding achievements in using computation, backed up by deep algebraic theory, to solve long-standing and difficult problems in group theory.
2003 Rod Gover For highly original contributions in conformal differential geometry, that has led to the solution of some outstanding and difficult problems.
2002 Bakhadyr Khoussainov For his contributions to computable model theory and the theory of automatic structures.
2001 Warren Moors For his impressive body of interconnected research work on the geometry and topology of Banach spaces, related questions of set-theoretic topology and especially non-smooth analysis and optimization where a number of deep insights of a foundational nature have been achieved.
2000 Graham Weir For his wide-ranging in-depth contributions to applied mathematical modelling covering a diverse range of phenomena including geosciences, structure of materials, corrosion theory, and the flow of granular material.
1999 Mike Steel For his fundamental contributions to the mathematical understanding of phylogeny, demonstrating a capacity for hard creative work in combinatorics and statistics and an excellent understanding of the biological implications of his results.
1998 Jianbei An For his contributions to the study of modular representations of groups, in which he has established his leading expertise through a combination of deep understanding, ingenuity and technical skill.
1997 Peter Lorimer For a lifetime of achievements in mathematical research, especially for his contributions to the application of group theory in geometry and combinatorics, and to the structure and classification of finite projective planes.
1996 Mavina Vamanamurthy For his prolific and far-reaching work in analysis and topology, especially for his contributions to the theory of quasiconformal mappings and special functions; contributions that are characterized by both analytic ingenuity and geometric insight.
1996 Geoff Whittle For his work on matroids and other combinatorial structures, in which he has contributed fruitful ideas and found beautiful new results; placing him in the forefront of recent workers on difficult problems of matroid representation.
1995 Vladimir Pestov For his creative and ingenious research in areas ranging from topological groups and Lie theory to the nonstandard analysis of superspace, in which he has solved long-standing open problems as well as demonstrating his breadth and depth of understanding and a gift for elegant and colourful exposition.
1995 Neil Watson For an outstanding series of research articles on harmonic functions and potential theory, in which he has introduced new ideas and tools, and deep analyses, that have resulted in new and improved approaches to classical theorems and led to their generalisation to more abstract situations.
1994 Gaven Martin For fundamental contributions in analysis, especially in complex analysis, requiring a careful and inventive blending of algebraic, analytic, and topological ideas, with applications in diverse areas ranging from differential equations, through hyperbolic geometric to low-dimensional topology.
1993 Marston Conder For research exhibiting insight and originality in solving problems in algebra and combinatorics, in which, by his outstanding skills in machine computation, he has demonstrated the effectiveness of the computer when guided by real intelligence.
1992 Rod Downey For penetrating and prolific investigations that have made him a leading expert in many aspects of recursion theory, effective algebra and complexity.
1992 Vernon Squire For major contributions to the science of ocean wave-ice interaction, ranging from the theoretical and mathematical to the experimental and practical aspects, that have made him the leading consultant in this field
1991 John Butcher For establishing new fundamental connections between analytic stability properties and algebraic properties of numerical methods for the solution of nonlinear differential equations; for implementing new methods; and for an outstanding monograph on Runge-Kutta and general linear methods.
1991 Rob Goldblatt For outstanding work in generalisations and applications of modal logic, including four books displaying a remarkable mastery of diverse aspects of mathematics from programming to space-time geometry.