The first Olli V. Lounasmaa Memorial Prize was awarded to Professor John Clarke from Berkeley University, USA, for his pioneering research and development work on ultra sensitive magnetometers called SQUIDs. The award ceremony took place on November 8, 2004, in the House of Estates in downtown Helsinki, at the monthly meeting of the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters. Professor Clarke was elected for the Prize by an international Selection Committee of Professors Mauri Airila (vice rector of TKK), Pekka Hautojärvi (TKK), Mikko Paalanen (chairman, TKK), Hans Ott (ETH, Switzerland) and Stig Stenholm (KTH, Sweden). Helsinki University of Technology, Finnish Academy of Sciences and Letters, and the Finnish Cultural Foundation financially supported the Memorial Prize.
On November 7th Prof. Clarke gave a lecture SQUIDs: From Cosmology to Magnetic Imaging in Microtesla Fields in Helsinki University of Technology.
The speech given by Mikko Paalanen during the award ceremony is given in Appendix III.