Turing Award

ACM Turing Award
Photo of Alan Turing
Alan Turing, the award's namesake
Awarded forOutstanding contributions in computer science
CountryUnited States
Presented byAssociation for Computing Machinery
Reward(s)US$1,000,000[1]
First awarded1966; 58 years ago (1966)
Last awarded2023
Websiteamturing.acm.org

The ACM A. M. Turing Award is an annual prize given by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) for contributions of lasting and major technical importance to computer science.[2] It is generally recognized as the highest distinction in the field of computer science and is often referred to as the "Nobel Prize of Computing".[3][4][5]

The award is named after Alan Turing, who was a British mathematician and reader in mathematics at the University of Manchester. Turing is often credited as being the founder of theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence,[6] and a key contributor to the Allied cryptanalysis of the Enigma cipher during World War II.[7]

From 2007 to 2013, the award was accompanied by a prize of US$250,000, with financial support provided by Intel and Google.[2][8] Since 2014, the award has been accompanied by a prize of US$1 million, with financial support provided by Google.[1][9]

The first recipient, in 1966, was Alan Perlis. The youngest recipient was Donald Knuth who won in 1974, at the age of 36,[10] while the oldest recipient was Alfred Aho who won in 2020, at the age of 79.[11] Only three women have been awarded the prize: Frances Allen (in 2006),[12] Barbara Liskov (in 2008),[13] and Shafi Goldwasser (in 2012).[14] As of 2024, 77 people have been awarded the prize, with the most recent recipient, in 2023, being Avi Wigderson.[15]

  1. ^ a b CACM Staff (2014). "ACM's Turing Award prize raised to $1 million". Communications of the ACM. 57 (12): 20. doi:10.1145/2685372.
  2. ^ a b "A. M. Turing Award". Association for Computing Machinery. Archived from the original on December 12, 2009. Retrieved November 5, 2007.
  3. ^ Dasgupta, Sanjoy; Papadimitriou, Christos; Vazirani, Umesh (2008). Algorithms. McGraw-Hill. p. 317. ISBN 978-0-07-352340-8.
  4. ^ "dblp: ACM Turing Award Lectures". informatik.uni-trier.de. Archived from the original on January 2, 2015. Retrieved February 11, 2023.
  5. ^ Brown, Bob (June 6, 2011). "Why there's no Nobel Prize in Computing". Network World. Archived from the original on December 4, 2023. Retrieved June 3, 2015.
  6. ^ Homer, Steven and Alan L. (2001). Computability and Complexity Theory. Springer. p. 35. ISBN 978-0-387-95055-6. Archived from the original on April 3, 2023. Retrieved November 5, 2007.
  7. ^ Copeland, Jack (June 18, 2012). "Alan Turing: The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'". BBC News Technology. Archived from the original on October 11, 2014. Retrieved October 26, 2014.
  8. ^ Geringer, Steven (July 27, 2007). "ACM'S Turing Award Prize Raised To $250,000". ACM press release. Archived from the original on December 30, 2008. Retrieved October 16, 2008.
  9. ^ "ACM's Turing Award Prize Raised to $1 Million". Association for Computing Machinery. Archived from the original on November 23, 2015. Retrieved November 13, 2014.
  10. ^ Zhongkai Shangguan; Zihe Zheng; Jiebo Luo (2021). "What Kind of Person Wins the Turing Award?". p. 1. arXiv:2104.05636 [cs.GL]. The youngest winner was Donald Knuth, who convinced the jury with "Computer Programming as an Art" and won [the] Turing Award in 1974 at the age of 36.
  11. ^ William L. Hosch. "Turing Award". Encyclopedia Britannica. Archived from the original on February 5, 2024. Retrieved March 12, 2024.
  12. ^ "First Woman to Receive ACM Turing Award" (Press release). The Association for Computing Machinery. February 21, 2007. Archived from the original on July 2, 2007. Retrieved November 5, 2007.
  13. ^ Cite error: The named reference liskov was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  14. ^ Cite error: The named reference goldwasser was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  15. ^ Cite error: The named reference wigderson was invoked but never defined (see the help page).