Top award for Sir Paul Callaghan
Sir Paul Callaghan, who lost a long battle with cancer in March, has received top honours at the 2012 World Class New Zealand Awards.
The world-renowned physicist was named "Supreme Winner" at the awards ceremony in Auckland last week, which celebrates "innovators and entrepreneurs who have made significant contributions to the country's growth and development".
Sir Paul, who performed groundbreaking work in the field of nanotechnology and magnetic resonance, was a founding director of the MacDiarmid Institute and received a knighthood in 2009 for his services for science.
Last year he won the Prime Minister's Science Prize and the Gunther Laukien Prize, and was named the 2011 New Zealander of the Year.
The awards praised Sir Paul's "exceptional leadership" as both a scientist and an administrator.
Sir Paul, a Victoria University BSc Honours and Oxford University PhD graduate, was a fellow of two royal societies and two institutes of physics.
He received seven medals and published more than 240 scientific papers and a book. He was also co-founder of Magritek, a high-tech start-up company.
Others recognised included Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Sir Graeme Douglas, Ian Taylor, Peter Watson, David Kirk, Jeremy Moon, Tony Falkenstein and Malcolm Grant.