As a member of Phi Kappa Phi I was asked to judge undergraduate and graduate research projects. These were a mix of Math, Physics, Chemistry, Earth science, Biology, Nursing, Forensic science, and more. I was asked to identify and put in rank order my top 3 papers in 2 categories, graduate and undergraduate. Aside from my dislike of the use of a scalar value measure this is truly comparing apples with oranges. It set me to trying to think of something better.
I think one might identify a few desirable characteristics and go hunting for them. (The vector components of a vector value measure.) Is the work original? Is it well supported by experiment? Is it useful? ... Then, if you find a really original paper give an award for originality. If you don't find any really original work don't give that award that year. If you find a paper that contained lots of good quality measurements then give an award for that. ... The awards given out will likely vary from one year to the next. There'd be no best and second best.
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