On the occasion of the birthday of P.A.M. Dirac, the ICTP Dirac Medal Committee takes pleasure in announcing that the 2007 Dirac Medal and Prize will be awarded to

Jean Iliopoulos, Laboratoire de Physique Théorique, Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris, France
and
Luciano Maiani, Università  degli Studi di Roma “La Sapienza”, Italy

“For their work on the physics of the charm quark, a major contribution to the birth of the Standard Model, the modern theory of Elementary Particles.”

The awards ceremony will be held at a later date.

Greek-born Jean Iliopoulos is one of the founding members of the Laboratoire de Physique Théorique which he has directed from 1991 to 1995 and from 1998 to 2002. He first visited ICTP in 1969 on the occasion of the Topical Conference on Renormalization Theory. He came back several times to attend activities in high energy physics, as well as the Symposium on Future Challenges in Science Dedicated to Daniele Amati, in 2001.
Luciano Maiani has been President of Italy’s National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN) from 1993 to 1997, and Director General of CERN from 1999 through 2003. Maiani has visited ICTP on several occasions, beginning in the academic year 1968-1969 as a High Energy Physics Guest Lecturer, and more recently as one of the organizers of the Abdus Salam Memorial Meeting in 1997.

The Dirac Medal selection committee is currently composed of Philip W. Anderson, Princeton University, USA; Nicola Cabibbo, University of Rome “La Sapienza”, Italy; David Gross, University of California at Santa Barbara, USA; Leo P. Kadanoff, University of Chicago, USA; Lord Martin Rees, University of Cambridge, UK; and Carl Wieman, University of Colorado, Boulder, USA.

Established in 1985 by the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics, the Dirac Medal, which is now recognized as one of the world's most prestigious prizes in physics, is given to scientists who have made significant contributions to theoretical physics and mathematics. Each recipient receives a cash award and a medal, and will also present a Dirac Medal lecture at ICTP at a later date. Recipients of the Nobel Prize, Fields Medal and Wolf Foundation Prize are not eligible for the Dirac Medal.
The announcement of the Dirac Medal is made each year on 8 August, the birth date of the great 20th century physicist Paul A.M. Dirac, who won the Nobel Prize in 1933. Dirac was a close associate and friend of ICTP from the Centre's first days in the early 1960s until his death in 1984.
For additional information about the Dirac Medal and the list of previous winners, see http://prizes.ictp.it/Dirac.