John Vickerman has been awarded the Médaille Pierre Chevenard by the Société Française de Métallurgie et de Matériaux (French Society for Metallurgy and Materials, SF2M). The award is made for his work in the development of Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry and is the first time the medal has been awarded to someone outside France in over 40 years.

The Pierre Chevenard medal is awarded by SF2M, in principle every two years, to a French or foreign national who has made an outstanding contribution in the areas which distinguished Pierre Chevenard; scientific instrumentation and methods of characterizing materials.

Pierre Chevenard (1888-1960)
Member of the French Academy of Sciences and the founding father of the Precision Metallurgy

Chevenard held the Chair of Metallurgy at the Ecole Supérieure des Mines, Saint-Etienne and was elected member of the Academy of Sciences, Section of Applied Sciences in 1946.

He was Commander of the Legion of Honor.

He began in Imphy Steelworks, and ended his career as Scientific Director of Commentry-Fourchambault-Decazeville.

His outstanding work earned him special awards including entering the Academy of Sciences, chairing the Society of Civil Engineers, and membership of the Higher Council for Scientific Research (1951), vice-president of the Scientific Council ONERA, vice-president of the Society of the Mineral Industry and President of the French Society of Physics.

The award ceremony will take place in Paris on 30 October, 2012.