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Jane Rigby Received the Presidential Medal of Freedom
2024.05.03
Jane Rigby, an astronomer who grew up in Delaware, is the chief scientist of the world’s most powerful telescope. A prolific researcher, Dr. Rigby embodies the American spirit of adventure and wonder.
Agency Honor Awards
2024.04.01
Congratulations to the following 660 members for receiving Agency Honor Awards!
Scott Barthelmy: Exceptional Public Service Medal
Koji Mukai: Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal
Regina Caputo: Exceptional Technology Achievement Medal
Elmer Sharp: Exceptional Technology Achievement Medal
Ron Gamble: Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility Medal
Marc Kuchner: Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility Medal
Ryan DeRosa: Silver Achievement Medal
PRIME Wide Field Imager Team: Group Achievement Award
SMD Bridge Program Workshop Organizing Committee: Group Achievement Award
XRISM team: Group Silver Achievement Medal
JWST Instrument Commissioning Team: Group Silver Achievement Meda
Astronomy Picture of the Day Honored for Outreach by IAU
2022.06.22
Astronomy Picture of the Day has been honored by the International Astronomical Union in the organization's inaugural round of outreach prizes. The website, created and run by Goddard’s Jerry Bonnell and Robert Nemiroff at Michigan Technological University, has served up daily astronomical images for 27 years, is available in 20 languages, and is seen by millions throughout the world. The award will be presented at the IAU General Assembly in Busan, South Korea, in August.
2021 Agency Honor Awards
2022.02.08
NASA announced its 2021 Agency Honor Awards this week. Included are several ASD scientists. Caroline Kilbourne (662) and Joan Centrella (660/retired) have won the Distinguished Service Medal, the Agency’s highest award. Mike Corcoran (662/CUA) has won the Exceptional Public Service Medal. Tom Barclay (667/UMBC) was awarded the Early Career Achievement Medal. Knicole Colon (667), Floyd Stecker (663), Eliahu Dwek (665/retired), and Eleonora Troja (661/UMCP) have won the Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal. The XRISM Resolve Dewar Leak Investigation Team won a Group Achievement Award. Congratulations to all!
Congratulations to the Robert H. Goddard Award Winners from ASD
2022.01.31
Congratulations to ASD staff who were announced this past week as winners of the Robert H. Goddard awards. Individual winners include Knicole Colón for mentoring and Barbara Mattson for outreach. Keith Gendreau was selected for the Award of Merit. The JWST NIRSpec IRS2 Algorithm Team was named a winner of the RHG science award.
First AAS Fellows include ASD Scientists
2020.02.28
The Fellows program of the American Astronomical Society (AAS), the major organization of professional astronomers in North America, was established in 2019 to honor members for their contributions toward the AAS mission of enhancing and sharing humanity's scientific understanding of the universe. The following members of ASD were honored among the first group of AAS Fellows, announced Feb. 25:
Edward Cheng
Alice Harding
Sangeeta Malhotra
Maxim Markevitch
John Mather
William Pence
Tod Strohmayer
Jean Hebb Swank
Kimberly Weaver
Poster Blowout 2019 is in the books!
2019.02.27
Photos from this year's Poster Blowout are available now. Congratulations to everyone, especially this year's winners!
Poster Blowout 2018
2018.02.05
Note from the Director:
I would like to thank the Director’s Science Committee for putting on an amazingly successful event where scientists and engineers across Goddard shared their work and made new contacts. The interdisciplinary interactions were especially exciting and crossed all four science disciplines.
Best,
Colleen
Click the title of this news item or the image below for more images from the poster party.
Congratulations to Charles Bennett, Gary Hinshaw, Norman Jarosik, Lyman Page Jr., David Spergel and the WMAP Science Team for winning the 2018 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics
2017.12.03
Congratulations to Charles Bennett, Gary Hinshaw, Norman Jarosik, Lyman Page Jr., David Spergel and the WMAP Science Team for winning the 2018 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics on Dec. 3! The citation reads: “For detailed maps of the early universe that greatly improved our knowledge of the evolution of the cosmos and the fluctuations that seeded the formation of galaxies.” The Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics was founded in 2012 by Yuri Milner to recognize those individuals who have made profound contributions to human knowledge. The team also includes:
Chris Barnes,
Olivier Doré,
Joanna Dunkley,
Ben Gold,
Michael Greason,
Mark Halpern,
Robert Hill,
Al Kogut,
Eiichiro Komatsu,
David Larson,
Michele Limon,
Stephan Meyer,
Michael Nolta,
Nils Odegard,
Hiranya Peiris,
Kendrick Smith,
Greg Tucker,
Licia Verde,
Janet Weiland,
Ed Wollack, and
Ned Wright
Congratulations to the many ASD members who were involved in the exciting gravitational wave and electromagnetic counterpart discovery of merging neutron stars, and the subsequent media activity around the discovery!
2017.10.23
Scientists:
Scott Barthelmy - Gamma-ray Coordinates Network system
Eric Burns - Fermi gamma ray burst study
Jordan Camp – GSFC LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC) PI
Brad Cenko - Swift PI
Tito Dal Canton - Gravitational wave localization maps; Virgo, joint LIGO/Virgo-Fermi-GBM study
Amy Lien - Swift follow up study
Julie McEnery - Fermi Project Scientist
Frank Marshall - Swift follow up study
Judy Racusin - Fermi gamma ray burst study, Swift follow-up study
Leo Singer - Gravitational wave localization maps, GROWTH follow-up study, joint LIGO/Virgo-Fermi-GBM study
Eleonora Troja - Chandra & HST follow-up, Swift follow-up study
Communications Team:
Elizabeth Ferrara - Fermi social media
Barb Mattson - Traditional & social media coordination
Sara Mitchell - Social media coordination & content creation
Brian Monroe - Animator
Frank Reddy - Cross-organizational coordination & writer for nasa.gov press release
Claire Saravia - Live shots
Amber Straughn - ASD Associate Director
Dewayne Washington - HQ/GSFC coordination
Scott Wiessinger - Video & multimedia
Congratulations to the Astrophysics Science Division scientists who are PIs and Co-Is on the recently announced Astrophysics Missions of Opportunity and Medium-Class Explorer missions!
2017.08.09
- ISS-TAO (Transient Astrophysics Observer on the ISS), a Mission of Opportunity proposal submitted to the 2016 Explorer opportunity, was selected for a Phase A study. ISS-TAO team members include PI Jordan Camp (663), Scott Barthelmy (661), Rob Petre (662), Judy Racusin (661), Brad Cenko (661), Frank Marshall (661), Jeremy Schnittman (663), Andy Ptak (662), and Amy Lien (661), Leo Singer (661), and Tod Strohmeyer (662). ISS-TAO is a wide-field X-ray transient detector aboard the International Space Station that would observe numerous events per year of X-ray transients related to compact objects. The mission’s primary goal is the detection of X-ray counterparts to gravitational waves produced by neutron stars merging with black holes and other neutron stars. Other targets would be supernova shocks, neutron star bursts, and high redshift gamma-ray bursts.
- Rob Petre (662), Andy Ptak (662), Alan Smale (660), and Lynne Valencic (662) are co-Is on Arcus (PI Randall Smith, SAO), selected as a concept study for a Medium-Class Explorer mission. Arcus would study stars, galaxies and clusters of galaxies using high-resolution X-ray spectroscopy to characterize the interactions between these objects and the diffuse million-degrees gas that surrounds and permeates them.
- Alan Smale (660) and Terri Brandt (661) are collaborators on COSI-X (PI Steve Boggs/UCB), selected as a concept study for an Explorer Mission of Opportunity. COSI-X is a balloon-borne, wide-field-of-view telescope designed to survey the gamma-ray sky at 0.2-5 MeV, performing high-resolution spectroscopy, wide-field imaging, and polarization measurements. COSI-X would map gamma-rays from antimatter around the Milky Way's center, as well as from newly-formed radioactive elements in the debris of stellar explosions.
Goddard Center Director Remarks on Passing of Neil Gehrels
2017.02.11
"Our center has lost a dear friend and astronomy pioneer, and his spirit will always live on in our work, said Goddard Center Director Chris Scolese. "Those of us who were fortunate to work with Neil know of his unwavering enthusiasm for science and unselfish generosity in mentoring others."
Neil Gehrels Awarded $1M 2017 Dan David Prize
2017.02.10
Neil Gehrels was posthumously awarded the $1 million 2017 Dan David Prize for "being the principal investigator of NASA's Swift Gamma Ray Burst Mission, which has transformed our view of the transient and variable sky in gamma-rays and in X-rays." Neil is one of three laureates announced this year in the field of astronomy. The Dan David Prize is headquartered at Tel Aviv University.
2017 Rossi Prize: Gabriela González and LIGO Scientific Collaboration
2017.01.25
The 2017 Rossi Prize has been awarded to Gabriela González at Louisiana State University and the LIGO Scientific Collaboration for "the first direct detections of gravitational waves, for the discovery of merging black hole binaries, and beginning the new era of gravitational-wave astronomy." The collaboration includes more than 1,000 scientists from more than 90 institutions around the world. ASD members are:
Scott Barthlemy
Jordan Camp
John Cannizzo
Tito Dal Canton
Neil Gehrels
Leo Singer
Science Jamboree event photos
2016.08.04
The 2016 Science Jamboree was a great success! A collection of 50 photos from the event are available now.
Mark Clampin Named Director of the Astrophysics Science Division
2015.11.06
Please welcome Mark Clampin into the key leadership position of Director of the Astrophysics Science Division. Mark came to Goddard in 2003 from the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI). Mark has been serving as the James Webb Space Telescope Observatory (JWST) Project Scientist at Goddard since 2003, providing science oversight of the Observatory's design through the initial phases of integration. From 2012 to 2014 he also served as the Chief Technologist of the Cosmic Origins and Physics of the Cosmos Program Offices. During the last year, he participated in the development of the Advanced Large Aperture Space Telescope (ATLAST) concept as a Senior Scientist. Mark assumes this position with a broad range of experience covering the scientific, technical and programmatic breadth of the division’s responsibilities. We are delighted he is accepting this new challenge and we look forward to working with him as he leads the outstanding team here in the Astrophysics Science Division.
2014 Agency Honor Award Recipients
2014.07.16
Please congratulate the 2014 Agency Honor Award recipients.
Outstanding Leadership Medal
Julie McEnery/661
Citation: For outstanding leadership of NASA’s Fermi Gamma Ray Observatory
Exceptional Achievement Medal
Matthew Greenhouse/665
Citation: For excellence achieved as Project Scientist to advance science technology and development for the James Webb Space Telescope instrument team.
Exceptional Technology Achievement Medal
Simon Bandler/662
Citation: For exceptional technology contribution in the development of X-ray quantum calorimeters with unprecedented energy resolution for future space astrophysics.
Group Achievement Awards
The Astro-H Soft X-Ray Telescope Team/Peter Serlemitsos/662 (POC)
ASD Team Members: Takashi Okajima (662), Lawrence G. Olsen (660.3)
Citation: For the development and timely delivery of the Astro-H Soft X-ray Telescopes, with performance exceeding mission goals.
Astro-H Soft X-Ray Spectrometer Instrument Team/Gary Sneiderman/592
ASD Team Members: Norman Dobson (660.3), Megan Eckart (662), Richard Kelley (662), Caroline Kilbourne (662), Frederick Scott Porter (662)
Citation: For the successful completion of the Astro-H Soft X-Ray Spectrometer Flight Hardware
Senior Review Results
2014.05.21
Congratulations to everyone who worked hard on the Senior Review proposals, and during the preceding 2 years to deliver great science results from our missions.
Welcome Padi Boyd to the Division Office!
2012.09.11
While Joan Centrella is on a 1 year detail to NASA HQ, Padi will be Acting Deputy Division Director.
2010 Science Jamboree
2010.05.12
Plans for the second annual science jamboree on June 2nd are progressing well. Please keep this day open on your calendars and avoid scheduling other meetings the same day! This will be a great opportunity to mix and mingle with your colleagues and see all the exciting science we lead at the center.
Nov 6: Elihu Boldt Memorial Symposium
2009.11.02
Last fall, September 12, 2008, Dr. Elihu Boldt passed away. Dr. Boldt was the first head of the X-ray Astrophysics Branch in the Laboratory of High Energy Astrophysics. Some who worked with him are honoring his memory with talks on subjects that he worked on or to which their work has evolved in a half day symposium on the morning of Nov. 6.
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