But indeed Einara's thesis "Towards better representation of water, CO2, and temperature exchanges at the land-atmosphere interface" deserves this recognition! You can find the papers that came out of her thesis here
tune.cee.princeton.edu/publications...

This is a National Award given by the Saint Anthony Falls Lab of the University of Minnesota, and many universities get to nominate only one thesis, and then among these select theses St Anthony Falls Lab selects one awardee.