| 1985 | Owen Gingerich | The Mysterious Nebulae, 1610-1924 |
| 1986 | Barry Madore | The Hubble Space Telescope |
| 1987 | René Racine | Small is Beautiful: The Quest for High Resolution Imaging in Astronomy |
| 1988 | Hubert Reeves | Early Moments of the Universe |
| 1989 | Roger Cayrel | La construction du téléscope CFH |
| 1990 | Joseph Veverka | Exploration of the Solar System: Voyager and Beyond |
| 1991 | Kimmo A. Innanen | The Prediction and Discovery of a New Solar System Object: The Planetary Trojan Asteroids |
| 1992 | Alan R. Hildebrand | The Cretaceous / Tertiary Boundary Impact (or the Dinosaurs Didn't Have A Chance) |
| 1993 | Margaret Geller | Mapping the Universe: So Many Galaxies, So Little Time |
| 1994 | George Efstathiou | The Origin of Galaxies |
| 1995 | David H. Levy | Springtime on Jupiter - a personal perspective on Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 |
| 1996 | Werner Israel | Black Holes |
| 1997 | Vera Rubin | What Hubble Didn’t Know About Our Galaxy |
| 1998 | David Crampton | Exploring the Frontier of the Universe with New Eyes |
| 1999 | Paul Chodas | The Impact Threat and Public Perception |
| 2000 | Wendy Freedman | The Age and Size of the Universe |
| 2001 | Jill Tarter | Pulling Signals out of Noise |
| 2002 | Paul Hodge | Barnard's Galaxy: Its Mysteries Revealed |
| 2003 | Michael Shara | Stellar Promiscuity and Destruction |
| 2004 | Sara Schechner | Politics and the Dimensions of the Solar System: John Winthrop's Observations of the Transits of Venus Expedition to St. John's, June 1761
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| 2005 | Michel Mayor | Des planètes gazeuses aux planètes rocheuses: Dix ans de découvertes de planètes extrasolaires |
| 2006 | Alan Hildebrand | Hunting for Doomsday asteroids from Earth and Space |
| 2007 | Steven Squyres | Science Results from the Mars Exploration Rover Mission |
| 2008 | Phil Plait | Bad Astronomy |
| 2009 | Lawrence Krauss | Life, the Universe and Nothing |
| 2010 | René Doyon | First Images of Exoplanets |
| 2011 | Dimitar Sasselov | The Search for a Sister Earth |
