Excerpt from the editorial of “Liquid Crystals” published online on 18 September 2014:

[…] I am delighted to report that the 2013 Luckhurst-Samulski Prize has been awarded to Pawel Pieranski and his colleagues for their paper entitled Generation of umbilics by magnets and flows. Geoffrey Luckhurst announced this decision and presented the Prize to Professor Pieranski at a ceremony held at the 25^th International Liquid Crystals Conference held in Dublin, Ireland. This paper differs from the others on this year’s shortlist, and indeed from the previous prizewinners, by being essentially pedagogical and as such was considered by the Selection Committee to make an important contribution into the subject. The paper demonstrates beautifully the generation of defects in liquid crystals, their interactions with external fields and the visualization of magnetic fields by means of liquid crystals. It is an absolute pleasure to read and will clearly advance our understanding of a fascinating element of liquid crystal behaviour. I would strongly encourage everybody, irrespective of their scientific background, to read this paper.[…]

Corrie T. Imrie

Chief editor of "Liquid Crystals"