Thomas Kuhn Paradigm Shift Award

The COMP Division of ACS developed the "Thomas Kuhn Paradigm Shift Award Competition" -- sponsored by OpenEye Scientific Software -- to highlight cutting edge research focusing drug discovery. Four abstracts were selected for 40 minute presentations to take place during a half-day symposium at the national meeting. The 2006 winner was Christopher Bayly (Merck-Frosst). The inaugural Thomas Kuhn Paradigm Shift Award Competition took place at the Spring 2006 National Meeting in Atlanta.

Criteria and Prize

A panel of judges will select the winning presentation with the speaker awarded a $1000 prize. Talks will be judged on the novelty of viewpoint, the cogency of argument and the potential impact if the speaker's paradigm were to become widely accepted.

About Thomas Kuhn

In the 1940's, while still a graduate student, Thomas Kuhn wrote a monograph on the nature of scientific revolution that was to become the most influential document on the nature of science of the Twentieth Century. Published in 1962 as 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions', Kuhn described what he saw as the "essential tension" between established ideas, or paradigms, and the new; scientific progress arose by conflict and not consensus. The "Thomas Kuhn Paradigm Shift Award" is designed as an opportunity for speakers to present views at odds with perceived wisdom, with particular emphasis on application to the science of drug discovery.