Nominations Will Open Soon for 2026 AAS Prizes

The window for submitting nominations for AAS prizes to be awarded in 2026 will open soon. Here’s what you need to know if you plan to nominate yourself or someone else for any of these prizes.

The AAS prizes for this cycle include the following:

• Annie Jump Cannon Award
• Beatrice M. Tinsley Prize
• Chambliss Amateur Achievement Award
• Chambliss Astronomical Writing Award
• Dannie Heineman Prize for Astrophysics
• Education Prize
• George Van Biesbroeck Prize
• Helen B. Warner Prize for Astronomy
• Henry Norris Russell Lectureship
• Joseph Weber Award for Astronomical Instrumentation
• Newton Lacy Pierce Prize in Astronomy
• AAS Fellows

Each of these prizes was established and endowed by an individual or committee. The criteria, qualifications, and restrictions for each prize were set at the time that the AAS accepted the prize. The result is a collection of prizes which vary quite a bit as far as who is eligible, how winners will be selected, how many winners may be selected each year, and what the winner or winners will receive with the prize. Be sure to read the prize description carefully before submitting a nomination.

Completing a nomination requires input from multiple individuals. The nominator is responsible for coordinating with all of them! Gone are the days when the nominator could submit a nomination without the nominee being aware. Nominees are now required to provide a substantial amount of documentation for their own nomination. 

Self-nominations are accepted for all the prizes. The nomination process does not allow the prize referees to know if a nomination was submitted by the nominee or by someone else. 

Nominees will be required to complete the AAS Professional Ethics Self Disclosure Form as part of the nomination. 

For more information on the nomination process, this nomination checklist is a great place to start!

Prize process tip: collect all the information you will need for completing the nomination, as described in the Nomination Checklist, before you begin the submission process. If you have all the required documents and information ready, the actual nomination can be completed in less than 10 minutes. 

The nominator must click the SAVE & SUBMIT button at the bottom of the final page of the nomination form to complete the nomination. It is not necessary to wait for the letters of support to be submitted. 

Nominations can be updated. To do so, please contact the AAS Secretary to assist in uploading new documents. If more than one or two documents will require updating, it is usually best to submit a new nomination. Each nomination remains active for 3 years, so nominees who were not selected in the first year of nomination will be considered again automatically. The exception to this rule is for early career prizes, where nominations will no longer be considered if the nominees is no longer within the window of eligibility. Please consult the rules for the individual prizes for more information.

Nominations for the 2026 AAS Prizes will open on 25 April.

The deadline for submitting nominations is 30 June.

If you plan to submit a prize nomination or several, this is a good time to start collecting the information you will need. Please consult the nomination checklist for all the details. If you run into problems using the online nomination form, don’t hesitate to ask for help! Most problems can be solved quickly, but some fixes take longer. Please don’t wait until the deadline to find out if you will need help.