AWARDS

​Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. (That's special; there are only 218 other physicists.) Teaching awards include the 1999 Distinguished Teaching Award of the University of California (for teaching physics majors), the 2009 Noyce Prize, and the 2010 Phi Beta Kappa Excellence in Teaching Award for Northern California. My other awards include the Mac Arthur Prize (1982), the NSF Alan T. Waterman Award, and the Texas Instruments Foundation Founders Prize. A complete list is below. My class Physics for Future Presidents was voted "Best Class on Campus" in 2008 and 2009. My feeling about the MacArthur Award is best expressed by a cartoon from the New Yorker.
Richard A. Muller has been honored by the following awards:
  • 1977 Texas Instruments Foundation Founders' Prize "for outstanding achievement in the physical sciences."
  • 1978 National Science Foundation Alan T. Waterman Award "for highly original and innovative research which has led to important discoveries and inventions in diverse areas of physics, including astrophysics, radioisotope dating, and optics."
  • 1982 MacArthur Foundation Prize Fellowship
  • 1984 Science Digest list of 100 Outstanding Scientists Under Age 40
  • 1985 Fellow, American Physical Society
  • 1989 Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters, American University of Switzerland
  • 1989 Newsweek citation as one of 25 Innovators in United States
  • 1990 Miller Professorship, University of California, Berkeley
  • 1991 Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science
  • 1999 Distinguished Teaching Award, University of California at Berkeley
  • 1999 Fellow, California Academy of Sciences
  • 2005 Citation by Chancelor Birgeneau "unsung hero" for helping students "beyond call of duty"
  • 2008 Physics for Future Presidents "Best Class on Campus" in student poll
  • 2009 Physics for Future Presidents "Best Class on Campus" (again)
  • 2009 Noyce Prize "For Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching"
  • 2009 Best Nonfiction Book, Northern California Book Reviewers Association
  • 2010 Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Sciences
  • 2010 Northern California Excellence in Teaching Award, phi beta kappa