W. Wallace McDowell Award

For outstanding recent theoretical, design, educational, practical, or other similar innovative contributions that fall within the scope of IEEE Computer Society interest

A certificate and US$2,000 honorarium are presented for outstanding recent theoretical, design, educational, practical, or other similar innovative contributions that fall within the scope of IEEE Computer Society interest.

Nomination Deadline:

1 October 2025 - 11:59PM EDT

NOMINATE

The award nomination requires a minimum of 3 endorsements.

Nomination Questions (pdf)

2025 W. Wallace McDowell Award Subcommittee Chair

Baining Guo, Microsoft

About Wallace McDowell

Past Recipients

2025 Raghu Meka: For contributions to complexity theory, pseudo randomness, communication complexity, and for establishing new connections between computer science and combinatorics, probability theory.
2024 Ming Li: For pioneering and enduring contributions to modern information theory and bioinformatics
2023 Amit P. Sheth: For pioneering and enduring contributions to information integration, data and service semantics, and knowledge-enhanced computing.
2022 Rafail Ostrovsky: For visionary contributions to computer security theory and practice, including foreseeing new cloud vulnerabilities and then pioneering corresponding novel solutions.
2021 Charu Aggarwal: For contributions to knowledge discovery and data mining.
2020 Sushil Jajodia: For contributions to the scientific and engineering principles that enable effective adaptive cyber defense.
2019 Rajesh K. Gupta: For seminal contributions in design and implementation of Microelectronic Systems-on-Chip and Cyberphysical Systems.
2018 Moti Yung: For innovative contributions to computer and network security, predicting, both attack scenarios and design needs in this important evolving era.
2017 Srinivas Devadas: For fundamental contributions that have shaped the field of secure hardware, impacting circuits, microprocessors, and systems.
2016 Dexter C. Kozen: For groundbreaking contributions to topics ranging from computational complexity, to the analysis of algebraic computations, to logics of programs and verification.
2015 Viktor K. Prasanna: For fundamental algorithmic and application specific architectural contributions to reconfigurable computing.
2014 Hanan Samet: For fundamental contributions to the development of multidimensional spatial data structures and indexing, translation validation, and proof-carrying code.
2013 Maurice Herlihy: For fundamental contributions to the theory and practice of multi-processor computation.
2012 Ronald Fagin: For fundamental and lasting contributions to the theory of databases.
2011 Ian F. Akyildiz: For pioneering contributions to wireless sensor network architectures and communication protocols.
2009 Jiawei Han: For significant contributions to knowledge discovery and data mining.
2008 Krishna V. Palem: For pioneering contributions to the algorithmic, compilation, and architectural foundations of embedded computing.
2007 Anil K. Jain: For pioneering contributions to theory, technique, and practice of pattern recognition, computer vision, and biometric recognition systems.
2006 Benjamin W. Wah: For fundamental contributions to the theory and applications of nonlinear and resource-constrained optimization.
2005 Krishan K. Sabnani: For seminal contributions to networking protocols and to wireless data networks.
2004 Simon Lam: For outstanding fundamental contributions in network protocols and security services.
2003 Sartaj K. Sahni: For contributions to the theory of NP-hard and NP-complete problems.
2002 Jaishankar M. Menon: For leading contributions on the architecture and design of data storage systems and RAID technology.
2001 Pradeep K. Khosla: For significant contributions to the design of re-configurable real-time software systems, and for significant contributions to undergraduate and graduate education in electrical and computer engineering and robotics.
2000 Raymond Ozzie: For his vision, determination, and programming skill in the development of Lotus Notes, a program that enables groups of people to work collaboratively over computer networks.
1999 Yale N. Patt: For your impact on the high performance microprocessor industry via a combination of important contributions to both engineering and education.
1998 Tilak Agerwala: For outstanding contributions to the development of high performance computers.
1997 Marc Andreessen: For developing a multi-platform browsing tool for the World Wide Web.
1997 Eric Bina: For developing a multi-platform browsing tool for the World Wide Web.
1996 Timothy Berners-Lee: For innovative invention of the World Wide Web, which extends hypertext to distributed information, which has brought about a revolutionary transformation in the use of computers and networks.
1995 Kenneth W. Kennedy: For important contributions to theory and practice of compiler optimization and leadership in the development of software for parallel computation.
1994 Federico Faggin: For the development of the Silicon Gate Process, and the first commercial microprocessor.
1990 Lawrence G. Roberts: For architecting packet switching technology and bringing it into practical use by means of the ARPA network.
1989 Edward B. Eichelberger: For developing the level-sensitive scan technique of testing solid-state logic circuits and for leading, defining, and promoting design for testability concepts.
1989 Thomas W. Williams: For developing the level-sensitive scan technique of testing solid-state logic circuits and for leading, defining, and promoting design for testability concepts.