Award 2001

delivered by the Société Française des Microtechniques et de Chronométrie (SFMC)

«This evening is for me an exceptional opportunity. For the fifth time, I am going to publically introduce to you the winners of the "2001 Prix Européen Temps-Fréquence". As the President of the Société Chronométrique de France, I believe this kind of event is extremely important for our scientific community, because it triggers competition and recognizes exceptional contributions. Like the previous winners, the winners this evening deserve worldwide recognition.

Again this year the choice of our committee was a hard task since many extremely good candidates were nominated. It is for me a great pleasure to announce that, in its session of February 21, 2001, the committee has attributed the Award simultaneously to :

Dr Pierre CEREZ (left)

for his outstanding contribution to the study and development of optically pumped cesium beam frequency standards,

and to

Dr Dieter KIRCHNER (right)

for outstanding contributions in development of satellite synchronisation techniques, in particular the two ways satellite time and frequency transfer, and for realization of the first telephone time code generators now largely used in the dissemination fields.

Claude Audoin will now present the work of Pierre Cerez whereas Patrizia Tavella will present the work of Dieter Kirchner. Then they will help me to deliver the award certificate and check… this is probably needed because of my real emotion in front of you.»

From left to right: Claude Audoin, Raymond Besson, Patrizia Tavella