[NASA ADS]   ADS Awards and Recognition

This page describes some of the awards presented to the ADS and to individual team members highlighting the importance of the Abstract Service to the scientific community.

United Nations General Assembly ". . . noted the great value of NASA's Astrophysics Data System in providing access to astronomical literature. Participants urge industrialized countries to ensure continuing support for free access to the system. . ." (Excerpt from "United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space, Report on the Tenth United Nations/European Space Agency Workshop on Basic Space Science: Exploring the Universe; Sky Surveys, Space Exploration and Space Technologies (Reduit, Mauritius, 25-29 June 2001.") Report number A/AC.105.766 (available online at https://www.oosa.unvienna.org/docsidx.html.))

U.S. National Academy of Science: "NASA's initiative for the Astrophysics Data System has vastly increased the accessability of the scientific literature for astronomers. NASA deserves credit for this valuable initative and is urged to continue it." (Excerpt from Astronomy and Astrophysics in the New Millennium, Policy Recommendations for NASA, p. 193. Available online at https://books.nap.edu/books/0309070317/html/193.html#pagetop.)

Center for Astrophysics Visiting Committee: "It is no exaggeration to say that ADS has revolutionized the use of the astronomical literature, dramatically changed the use and focus of astronomical libraries, empowered astronomy research in underdeveloped countries and small institutions, and is probably the most valuable single contribution to astronomy research that the CfA has made in its lifetime." (From Report of the CfA Visiting Committee, 2002)

The American Astronomical Society awarded the 2001 van Biesbroeck Prize to Michael Kurtz "... the visionary designer of the Astrophysics Data System (ADS) which clearly has revolutionized for over a decade the speed and thouroughness in which astronomers now can search and access the vast and still growing technical literature." Excerpt from Physics Today Vol. 54, iss. 6, p. 72

Special Libraries Association awarded the 2001 Physics, Astronomy and Mathematics Division Award to Guenther Eichhorn for his role "in the genesis and growth of the Astrophysics Data System, the development of which represents an unparalleled shift in the propagation of the literature of astronomy. ... Under your leadership, the ADS, ..., has become an indispensable aid to astronomical research." A Physics Today article mentioning this award can be found online Physics Today Vol. 54, iss. 8, p. 61