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Hughes Medal
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<p>The Hughes Medal is a <a href="/facts/Silver-gilt/2zlqrGxa">silver-gilt</a> medal awarded by the <a href="/facts/Royal_Society/KI5yXCuV">Royal Society</a> of London "in recognition of an original discovery in the physical sciences, particularly electricity and magnetism or their applications". Named after <a href="/facts/David_E._Hughes/xkE0SvxN">David E. Hughes</a>, the medal is awarded with a gift of £1000. The medal was first awarded in 1902 to <a href="/facts/J._J._Thomson/Y4jyndJF">J. J. Thomson</a> "for his numerous contributions to electric science, especially in reference to the phenomena of electric discharge in gases", and has since been awarded over one hundred times. Unlike other <a href="/facts/Awards,_lectures_and_medals_of_the_Royal_Society/FD6F31eC">Royal Society medals</a>, the Hughes Medal has never been awarded to the same individual more than once. </p><p>The medal has on occasion been awarded to multiple people at a time; in 1938 it was won by <a href="/facts/John_Cockcroft/Is5qGyKV">John Cockcroft</a> and <a href="/facts/Ernest_Walton/97mCDtyU">Ernest Walton</a> "for their discovery that nuclei could be disintegrated by artificially produced bombarding particles", in 1981 by <a href="/facts/Peter_Higgs/zGvqlC99">Peter Higgs</a> and <a href="/facts/Tom_W._B._Kibble/3D1YbVel">Tom Kibble</a> "for their international contributions about the spontaneous breaking of fundamental symmetries in elementary-particle theory", in 1982 by <a href="/facts/Drummond_Matthews/L4BICHdz">Drummond Matthews</a> and <a href="/facts/Frederick_Vine/EB6LMPvo">Frederick Vine</a> "for their elucidation of the magnetic properties of the ocean floors which subsequently led to the plate tectonic hypothesis" and in 1988 by <a href="/facts/Archibald_Howie/frG8JVRk">Archibald Howie</a> and <a href="/facts/M._J._Whelan/1mqVajbv">M. J. Whelan</a> "for their contributions to the theory of electron diffraction and microscopy, and its application to the study of lattice defects in crystals". </p>