Copernicus Award Copernicus Award The Nicolaus Copernicus Polish-German Research Award (also known as Copernicus Award) is a biannual science award conferred by Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft and Foundation for Polish Science "to the individuals most active in Polish-German scientific cooperation who have made exceptional research achievements as a result of that cooperation." The award was established in 2006 and is named after Renaissance astronomer and polymath Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543). It carries a cash prize of €200,000 shared equally by two winners, one from Germany and one from Poland. In order to be eligible for the award, candidates must have at least a doctoral degree
Copernicus (lunar crater) formation. Copernicus itself was a possible landing site for the canceled Apollo 20 mission. Copernicus is named after the astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus. Like many of the craters on the Moon's near side, it was given its name by Giovanni Riccioli, whose 1651 nomenclature system has become standardized. Riccioli awarded Copernicus a prominent crater despite the fact that, as an Italian Jesuit, he conformed with church doctrine in publicly opposing Copernicus's heliocentric system. Riccioli justified the name by noting that he had symbolically thrown all the heliocentrist astronomers into the Ocean of Storms. However, astronomical historian Ewan Whitaker suspects that the