The Institute of Physics (IOP) has launched a new award to help universities attract, support and retain a diverse physics community. The Physics Inclusion Award will encompass several aspects of diversity such as race and ethnicity, neurodiversity and sexual orientation.

It replaces the long-established Project Juno, which rewarded university physics departments and organizations that showed they had taken action to address gender equality.

Project Juno was originally set up after the IOP examined the challenges facing UK university departments in the mid-2000s. Over the last 15 years, the number of women physics professors at UK universities has doubled, with women now making up a quarter of academic staff. But there remain many parts of the population that are under-represented in physics. Less than 1% of university physics staff, for example, are Black.

A steering group, chaired by University of Birmingham theoretical physicist Nicola Wilkin, began work on the new award in 2021. A pilot scheme ran from September 2023 to January 2024 involving staff from 11 physics departments in the UK and Ireland. They worked through a Physics Inclusion Award self-assessment tool, reviewed the effectiveness of the award criteria and took part in feedback sessions with the IOP.

“Building upon the success of Project Juno, [the new award] widens our offer to anyone who faces barriers because of who they are or where they come from – so that everyone is welcomed and included in physics”, says the IOP president, atomic physicist Keith Burnett. “To realize the incredible potential physics offers society, we need a growing, diverse, sustainable physics community which drives the physics of today and attracts the generation of tomorrow.”

Applications for the new award will open in late 2024.