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The Hughes medal in particular is awarded to: "An original discovery in the physical sciences, particularly electricity and magnetism or their applications." (Royal Society website)

It is made of silver gilt, and has been handed out since 1902, beginning with the eminent atomic physicist J.J. Thomson, discoverer of the electron. Several other notable people have also won the medal, including Hans Geiger, Alexander Graham Bell, Stephen Hawking, and Enrico Fermi.

1 Hughes Medal Winners

• 2004 John Clarke
• 2003 Peter Edwards
• 2002 Alexander Dalgarno
• 2001 John Pethica
• 2000 Chintamani Rao
• 1999 Alexander Boksenberg
• 1998 Raymond Hide
• 1997 Andrew Lang (Physicist)
• 1996 Amyand Buckingham
• 1995 David Shoenberg
• 1994 Robert Chambers (Physicist)
• 1993 George Isaak
• 1992 Michael Seaton
• 1991 Philip Moon
• 1990 Thomas George Cowling
• 1989 John Bell
• 1988 A. Howie and M.J. Whelan
• 1987 Michael Pepper
• 1986 M.M. Woolfson
• 1985 Tony Skyrme
• 1984 Roy Kerr
• 1983 John Ward
• 1982 Drummond Matthews and Frederick Vine
• 1981 Peter Higgs, Thomas Walter and Bannerman Kibble
• 1980 Francis Farley
• 1979 Robert Williams
• 1978 William Cochran
• 1977 Anthony Hewish
• 1976 Stephen Hawking
• 1975 Richard Dalitz
• 1974 Peter Fowler
• 1973 Peter Hirsch
• 1972 Brian David JosephsonBrian David Josephson (born Cardiff, Wales, UK, January 4, 1940) is a British physicist whose discovery of the Josephson effect while a 22-year-old graduate student won him a share (with Leo Esaki and Ivar Giaever) of the 1973 Nobel Prize for Physics.
• 1971 Robert Hanbury BrownRobert Hanbury Brown was a British astronomer and physicist born 31 August 1916 in Aruvankadu, India. Brown studied at the University of London, from where he received a Master's degree in 1935. From 1936 to 1942 he worked for the Air Ministry, where he h
• 1970 David BatesSir David Bates FRS (born 18 November 1916) was an Irish mathematician and physicist. Born in Omagh, County Tyrone, he moved to Belfast with his family in 1925, attending the Royal Belfast Academical Institution. He enrolled with the Queen's University of
• 1969 Nicholas Kurti
• 1968 Freeman DysonFreeman John Dyson (born December 15, 1923) is an English-born American physicist and mathematician. He worked as an analyst for the British Bomber Command during World War II; after the war, he moved to Princeton. In the years following the war, Dyson wa
• 1967 Kurt Mendelssohn
• 1966 Nicholas Kemmer
• 1965 Denys Wilkinson
• 1964 Abdus SalamAbdus Salam ( January 29, 1926 November 21, 1996) received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1979 for his work in electroweak theory, which is the mathematical and conceptual synthesis of the electromagnetic and weak interactions—the latest stage reached unti
• 1963 Frederic Williams
• 1962 Brebis Bleaney
• 1961 Alan Cottrell
• 1960 Joseph Pawsey
• 1959 Alfred Pippard
• 1958 Edward da Costa Andrade
• 1957 Joseph Proudman
• 1956 Frederick Lindemann
• 1955 Harrie Massey
• 1954 Martin RyleSir Martin Ryle ( September 27, 1918 October 14, 1984) was a British radio astronomer who developed revolutionary radio telescope systems (see eg aperture synthesis) and used them for accurate location of weak radio sources. With improved equipment, he ob
• 1953 Edward Bullard
• 1952 Philip Dee
• 1951 Hendrick Kramers
• 1950 Max Born
• 1949 Cecil Powell
• 1948 Robert Watson-Watt
• 1947 Jean Joliot
• 1946 John Randall
• 1945 Basil Schonland
• 1944 George Finch
• 1943 Marcus Oliphant
• 1942 Enrico Fermi
• 1941 Nevill Mott
• 1940 Arthur Compton
• 1939 George Paget Thomson
• 1938 John Cockcroft and Ernest Walton
• 1937 Ernest Lawrence
• 1936 Walter H. Schottky
• 1935 Clinton Davisson
• 1934 Manne Siegbahn
• 1933 Edward Victor Appleton
• 1932 James Chadwick
• 1931 William Bragg
• 1930 Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman
• 1929 Hans Geiger
• 1928 Maurice de Broglie
• 1927 William Coolidge
• 1926 Henry Jackson
• 1925 Frank Edward Smith
• 1924 Not awarded
• 1923 Robert Millikan
• 1922 Francis William Aston
• 1921 Niels Bohr
• 1920 Owen Richardson
• 1919 Charles Chree
• 1918 Irving Langmuir
• 1917 Charles Barkla
• 1916 Elihu Thomson
• 1915 Paul Langevin
• 1914 John Townsend
• 1913 Alexander Graham Bell
• 1912 William Duddell
• 1911 Charles Wilson
• 1910 John Ambrose Fleming
• 1909 Richard Glazebrook
• 1908 Eugen Goldstein
• 1907 Ernest Howard Griffiths
• 1906 Hertha Ayrton
• 1905 Augusto Righi
• 1904 Joseph Swan
• 1903 William Hittorf
• 1902 J. J. Thomson