Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation Award
Launched in 2016, the Doctoral Dissertation Award is awarded annually to recognize a recent doctoral candidate who has successfully defended and completed his or her Ph.D. dissertation in computer graphics and interactive techniques. Recognizing young researchers who have already made a notable contribution very early during their doctoral study, the award is presented each year at the SIGGRAPH Conference and is accompanied by a plaque, complimentary full conference registration and travel to the award ceremony. Honorable Mentions may also be awarded.
Current Recipient
Zachary Ferguson
For a dissertation which significantly extends the state of the art in physical simulation by presenting new groundbreaking methods to handle contacts in dynamic simulations of rigid and deformable objects
“Provably Robust and Accurate Methods for Rigid and Deformable Simulation with Contact”
Previous Recipients
- 2023 Cheng Zhang
- 2022 Xue Bin Peng
- 2021 Minchen Li
- 2020 Tzu-Mao Li
- 2019 Lingqi Yan
- 2018 Jun-Yan Zhu
- 2017 Felix Heide
- 2016 Eduardo Simões Lopes Gastal
Honorable Mentions
- 2023 Georg Sperl
- 2022 Yuanming Hu, MIT
- 2021 David B. Lindell
- 2020 Yun Raymond Fei
- 2020 Mina Konakovic Lukovic
- 2019 Angela Dai
- 2019 Hao Su
- 2019 Adriana Schulz
- 2017 Myers Abraham (Abe) Davis
- 2017 Matthew O’Toole
- 2016 Sofien Bouaziz
Nomination Procedure
All doctoral dissertations successfully defended (or thesis accepted) during the calendar year prior to the nomination deadline are eligible for consideration. There is no limit on the number of nominations that can be made from any single institution or advisor. The key criteria used to evaluate the nominations include technical depth, significance of the research contribution, potential impact on theory and practice, and quality of presentation.
The submitted dissertation should be a finalized version. Nominations are welcomed from any country, but only English language versions will be accepted. Nominations are evaluated by the Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation Award Committee. Nominations, including all supporting materials and endorsement letters, are due by January 31 of each year. Click the button below to submit a nomination.
Requirements
- Name, address, phone number, and email address of the nominator
- Name, address, and email address of the candidate
- Suggested citation (maximum of 25 words)
- Nomination statement (maximum of 500 words in length) addressing why the candidate should receive this award
- Copy of the dissertation in pdf format
- The nominee’s vitae
- Endorsement letters: at most three supporting letters could be included from experts in the field