The Arthur Thomas Ippen Award recognises an IAHR member who has demonstrated conspicuously outstanding ability, originality, and accomplishment in basic hydraulic research and/or applied hydraulic engineering, and who holds great promise for continuation of a high level of productivity in this profession.

This award was established in 1977 to honour the memory of Professor Ippen, IAHR President (1959-1963) and IAHR Honorary Member (1963-1974), and for many decades an inspirational leader in fluids research, hydraulic engineering and international co-operation and understanding.

Who can be awarded?

The Arthur Thomas Ippen Award (hereinafter referred to as the Award) is presented biennially by IAHR at its biennial World Congress to one of its members who has demonstrated conspicuously outstanding record of accomplishment as demonstrated by his/her research, publications and/or conception and design of significant engineering hydraulic works, and who holds great promise for a continuing level of productivity in the field of basic hydraulic research and/or applied hydraulic engineering.

No individual shall receive the Award more than once.

Age limit

The awardee shall be a member under 45 years of age on 31 December of the year the Award is conferred at the IAHR World Congress.

Nomination

To submit a nomination please download the form and send it to awards@iahr.org by 31 January 2025.

Selection procedure

Each awardee will be selected by vote of the IAHR Council from a list of no more than three nominees submitted to the Council by the IAHR Awards Committee (hereinafter referred to as the Awards Committee).

The awardee for each award cycle will be endorsed by the IAHR Council either at its meeting during the year preceding the World Congress or by on-line ballot in March of the year of the World Congress.

The award won't be given where the IAHR Council considers none of the nominees is of sufficient quality.

When and where will the award recipient be announced? 

The award is presented at the IAHR World Congress,  where the recipient delivers the Arthur Thomas Ippen lecture.

The subject of the lecture will be agreed upon by the awardee and the IAHR President. The lecture will be published in the Congress proceedings. Public presentation of the Award will be made by the President at the World Congress opening ceremony.

What does the award consist of? 

The awardee will be given a suitable certificate which will state the purpose of the Award and indicate the specific contribution(s) of area(s) of endeavour for which the awardee is recognised. The awardee also will receive a monetary honorarium upon presentation of the lecture. The terms of the honorarium will be published in the announcement of each biennial Award. The monetary honorarium for the Award is USD 1,500. 

The Award Fund, which was established by Professor Ippen's family, is authorised to receive contributions from IAHR members and Professor Ippen's friends.

For further information, please refer to our FAQs section on our website. Additional enquiries regarding the nomination process should be directed to the IAHR Secretariat via email to awards@iahr.org

23rd Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2023
Chunhui Lu, China. For his outstanding achievement in groundwater research and application, and extensive works on coastal groundwater dynamics and sustainability. Announcement
>> Ippen Lecture: Exploring natural and anthropogenic impacts on freshwater lens on small islands

 
22nd Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2021 
Sebastien Erpicum, Belgium. For his outstanding leading research regarding the hydraulics and fluid mechanics of hydraulic structures. Announcement
>> Ippen lecture: Hydraulic structures engineering and research: why and where to?

21st Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2019  
Claudia Adduce, Italy. For her outstanding contributions in the field of experimental and numerical modeling and innovation in experimental techniques with applications to stratified flows and sediment transport.
>> Ippen lecture: Gravity Currents propagating over complex topography: implications for fluid entrainment and sediment transport

20th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2017
Qiuwen Chen, China. For his outstanding contributions in the field of environmental hydroinformatics and ecohydraulics.
>> Ippen lecture: Cellular Automata in ecohydraulics modeling: principles, scales and applications

19th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2015
Damien Violeau, France. For his outstanding contributions in the field of fluid mechanics with special emphasis on turbulence modeling for addressing complex, real-life hydraulics problems.
>> Ipppen lecture: Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics: a Lagrangian Approach to Hydraulics  

18th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2013
George Constantinescu, USA. For his outstanding contributions in the field of fluid mechanics and especially of turbulence modeling with applications to fluvial hydraulics and stratified flows.
>> Ippen lecture: On the influence of coherent structures on flow hydrodynamics, transport and mixing at river confluences

17th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2011
Xavier Sánchez-Vila, Spain. For outstanding contributions in the field of groundwater flow and contaminant transport with application to flow modeling in heterogeneous porous media.
>> Ippen lecture: Dealing with complex transport problems in groundwater: when one is expected to provide exact solutions with little to none information

16th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2009
Yarko Niño, Chile. For outstanding basic contributions in lfuid mechanics with applications to sediment transport and environmental flow porcesses.
>> Ippen lecture: The water environment and human needs: A case study involving the hydrodynamics of a coastal lake in Southern Chile

15th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2007
Mohamed S. Ghidaoui, Hong Kong SAR China. For outstanding contribution to research in environmental fluid mechanics.
>> Ippen lecture: Ippen’s Analogy and the Development of Hydraulic Models using Boltzmann’s Kinetic Theory of Gases

14th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2005
Ana María Ferreira Da Silva, Canada. For outstanding contributions in the area of fluvial processes and in particular, sediment transport.
>> Ippen lecture: On Why and How Do Rivers Meander

13th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2003
Hubert Chanson, Australia. For numerous contributions to congresses and scientific journals, invited lectures short courses, and book authorship in the areas of hydraulic structure design, and transfer processes in turbulent flow, and for his active contribution to IAHR congresses, the River-list discussion group, and the Hydraulic Structures section.
>> Ippen lecture: Hydraulic Engineering: Where to?

12th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 2001
Marcelo H. Garcia, USA. For creative and original research and publications on sediment transport, fluvial hydraulics and mudflow, for his application of hydraulic theory to engineering problems, for his mentoring and guiding of research students as an educator, and for his devoted services to the hydraulic profession.

11th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1999
Vladan Babovic, Yugoslavia. For achievements in original research and development leading to the engineering applications and implementation of Hydroinformatics real-time control and decision support systems.

10th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1997
Willi H. Hager, Switzerland. For outstanding contribution to research work and application in river mechanics and morphology and sediment transport.

9th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1995
Gary Parker, USA. For contribution to research work in river mechanics and morphology, and sediment transport.

8th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1993
Y.K. Tung, USA. For outstanding contributions in the area of probabilistic analysis of water resources engineering problems, and research in hydraulics and hydrology including rainfall-runoff modelling and flood routing.

7th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1991
Roger A. Falconer, UK. For outstanding contributions in the area of computational flow modelling of coastal and estuarine waters and associated environmental problems.

6th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1989
Gerard H. Jirka, Germany. For basic research contributions in stratified flows, air-water-sediment transfer processes, innovation in experi­mental techniques and for applied research contributions in waste heat disposal and the environmental impact of energy facilities.

5th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1987
Wolfgang Rodi, Germany. For contribution to the mathematical modelling of turbulence phenomena in hydraulics.

4th Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1985
K.G. Ranga Raju, India. For many contributions to the understanding and formulation of river processes.

3rd Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1983
Forrest M. Holly Jr., USA. For contributions to the study of turbulent diffusion, sediment transport and river stability and the development of numericalsimulation thereof.

2nd Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1981
J.P. Benqué, France. For contributions to fluid mechanics in particular to the development of numerical simulation of complex natural and industrial flows.

1st Arthur Thomas Ippen Award | 1979
F. Durst, Germany. For contributions to research in fluid mechanics, in particular to the development of measuring techniques for experimental studies of complex flow fields.