Nominations for the award are judged by the Surface Technologies Leadership Team.

2024
Monitoring corrosion rates with ER-probes: A critical assessment based on experiments and numerical modelling
Dr Federico Martinelli-Orlando & Prof Ueli Angst

2022
Not awarded

2021
Not available

2020
On the Volta potential measured SKPFM-fundamental and practical aspects with relevance to corrosion science
Cem Örnek, Cristofer Leygraf, Jinshan Pan

2018
Characterising the early stages of crack development in environment-assisted cracking
A Turnbull

2017
Effect of Fe ion concentration on corrosion of carbon steel in CO₂ environment
M. Rogowska, J. Gudme, A. Rubin, K. Pantleon & R. Ambat 
Effect of Fe ion concentration on fatigue life of carbon steel in aqueous CO₂ environment
M. Rogowska, J. Gudme, A. Rubin, K. Pantleon & R. Ambat 

2016
Effect of thermal exposure on degradation of compressor blades in aero-jet engines
R. J. Bennett, S. W. Booth & C. M. Younes 

2015
Effect of sulphur species on anerobic corrosion of carbon steel in alakline media
N. R. Smart, A. P. Rance, P. A. H. Fennell & B. Kursten

2014
Stress corrosion cracking of Ru doped 304 stainless steel in high temperature water
F Scenini, K Govender, S Lyon & A Sherry, A. 2012
Influence of Pd and Ru additions on stress corrosion cracking of austenitic stainless steels
F Scenini, K Govender, S Lyon & A Sherry

2013
Pitting corrosion of stainless steel: Measuring and modelling pit propagation in support of damage prediction for radioactive waste containers
S M Ghahari, D P Krouse, N J Laycock, T Rayment, C Padovani, T Suter, R Mokso, F Marone, M Stampanoni, M Monir & A J Davenport

2012
Preferential weld corrosion of X65 pipeline steel in flowing brines containing carbon dioxide
Dr M J Robinson & Dr K Alawadhi

2011
Localised corrosion of heat treated alloys' Parts 1 and 2
G Tormoen, N Sridhar & A Anderko

2010
Effect of shot peening on high temperature oxidation behaviour of boiler steel; experimental results and simulation
R Narapaju, V B Trindade, H-J Christ & U Krupp

2009
Acoustic emission from pittng corrosion in stressed stainless steel plate
C Lee, J Scholey, S Worthington, P Wilcox, M Wisnom, M Friswell & B Drinkwater

2008
Accelerated exposure tests as evaluation tool for estimating life of organic coatings on steel bridges
I T Kim & Y Itoh

2007
Examples of mathematical modelling of long term general corrosion of structural steels in sea water
R E Melchers

2006
Validation of localised corrosion model using real time corrosion monitoring in a chemical plant
N Sridhar, A Anderko, L T Yang, S L Grise, B J Saldanha & M H Dorsey

2005
Anodic and cathodic models for interpreting polarisation behaviour of ceramic-coated substrates containing pre-existing breaches
L H Hihara

2004
Holistic Model for Atmospheric Corrosion: Part 1 – Theoretical Framework for Production, Transportation and Deposition of Marine Salts
I S Cole, D A Paterson & W D Ganther

2003
Microbially influenced corrosion on stainless steels in waste water treatment plants
Dr A Iversen 

1991
Stress corrosion cracking: 1965-1990
R C Newman & R P M Procter

1990
Corrosion of stainless steels in natural, transported and artificial sea waters
P Gallagher, R E Malpas & E B Shone

1989
Corrosion of structural steelwork in bridge enclosures, box sections and anchorage chambers
P R Vassie

1988
Application of dimensionless groups to corrosion testing with and without heat transfer
E F C Somerscales

1987
Effects of heat flux on corrosion og hifh pressure boilers
L Tomlinson & A M Pritchard

1986
Effect of pollutants on corrosion of copper alloys in sea water
R Francis

1985
Modelling approach to corrosion prediction
C Edeleanu & J G Hines

1984
Stress corrosion resistance of transverse precracked prestressing tendons in tension
K F McGuinn & M Elices

1983
Not awarded

1982
Development of electrolytes for the electrochemical dezincification
J E Bowers, P W R Oseland & G C Davies

1980
Crevice corrosion of stainless steels
J W Oldfield & J L Dawson

1979
Corrosion monitoring using polarisation resistance measurements
L M Callow, J A Richardson & J L Dawson

In the early years of this century there were few workers concerned with corrosion studies whose names were widely known. Of these, Guy Dunstan Bengough, FRS, must rank among the leaders in this field.

Born in 1876, he was educated at Malvern and at Selwyn College, Cambridge, where he graduated in 1898. With an initial interest in botany and zoology, later to prove invaluable in dealing with problems of marine fouling, he nevertheless rapidly acquired an interest in metallurgy, studying the subject at the Royal School of Mines. His appointment as Lecturer at the Sir John Cass Technical Institute in London led to the foundation there of the Department of Metallurgy, and was followed by successive appointments as Lecturer in Metallurgy at Birmingham University and, in 1911, at the new Metallurgy Department of Liverpool University.

In the same year, he was invited by the recently formed Corrosion Committee of the Institute of Metals to review existing knowledge of the corrosion of non-ferrous metals, The survey that he made, with proposals for the further research that the survey showed to be much needed, set him firmly on the way he was to follow for the rest of his life. Encouraged by the Committee, he began the researcher proposed, and was making progress when the outbreak of war in 1914 drew him into the army service. However, in 1916, the serious threat to the serviceability of warships posed by corrosion led to the installation of Bengough at the Royal School of Mines to give urgent attention to the preservation of marine condenser-tubes. He was responsible, in the period up to 1924, for the preparation, with several collaborators, of seven research reports in which the operating conditions inimical to condenser-tube lives were revealed for the first time. Although most of the work was concerned with the brasses, then the usual condenser-tube material, the basic findings on operating conditions have continued to be a useful guide in the development and selection of more resistant alloys. The move to superior materials was itself foreshadowed in comments on nickel-copper alloys contained in the last report.

In 1924, the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research under the late Sir Harold Carpenter set up a new committee for the express purpose of studying corrosion and its more fundamental aspects. Bengough was the natural choice for an Investigator in this work which was then initiated at the Royal School of Mines. However, an immediate ad hoc problem first required attention, namely, the protection of aluminium alloys against corrosion for the Royal Air Force. With his collaborator, J M Stuart, he developed the well-known process of anodic oxidation (anodising) which, with subsequent variations and development, remains today as an important technical process.

In 1927, with the opening of the Department's Chemical Research Laboratory at Teddington under the late Sir Gilbert Morgan, Bengough moved with his staff to Teddington, where he established a vigorous school of corrosion research. A stream of papers resulted from this group which, together with the school of U. R. Evans at Cambridge, dominated fundamental corrosion research in the United Kingdom between the wars. Both groups gave their support also to the more directly practical investigations initiated by the Corrosion Committee of the Iron and Steel Institute under the direction of Dr J C Hudson.

Bengough, despite his metallurgical background, continually emphasised that corrosion was in many respects more the territory of the chemist than of the metallurgist, and he applied this approach throughout his research. His outstanding contribution in this period was to stress the amenability of corrosion processes to clearly defined laws, and in support of this his experimental work was conducted under strictly defined and reproducible conditions aimed at establishing the factors that control corrosion rates.

Bengough was a man who had experience of the whole spectrum of corrosion studies, from the severely practical needs of preventing corrosion in service conditioned, to the detailed and precise nature of the processes and factors by which corrosion is controlled.

A quiet dignified personality, a military bearing and a keen interest in athletics and mountaineering contributed to the overall impressive character of the man. He died in 1945, but many who are still active remember him with gratitude and admiration. They, especially, will be please that an apt way of commemorating his life and work have been found. He was closely associated with the Corrosion Committee of both the Institute of Metals and the Iron and Steel Institute and it is wholly appropriate that The Metals Society formed by the union of the two Institutes, should now announce an annual award of a medal and a money prize in his name. The award will be made for a paper published in one of the Society's journals on criteria that Bengough would probably have approved and, appropriately, the medal will be anodised aluminium.

A D M & S C B

Obituary notices of Dr Bengough appeared in Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society, Vol. 5, November 1945, pp 169-178(with list of publications); and in J. Chem. Soc., 1946, pp 63-65. A bibliography of papers published by his team and their successors at Teddington was issued by the National Physical Laboratoty in the centenary year of his birth and is available from that laboratory.

Br. Corros. J., 1979, Vol. 14, No. 1