2014

Faculty members Bob Kirshner and Chris Stubbs,  graduate alums Adam Riess and Brian Schmidt, win Breakthrough Prize

Faculty members Bob Kirshner and Chris Stubbs, graduate alums Adam Riess and Brian Schmidt, win Breakthrough Prize

November 10, 2014

The High-Z Supernova Search Team and the Supernova Cosmology Project have been awarded the 2015 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics for the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the Universe. There are 51 team members sharing one award. Saul Perlmutter, Adam Riess and Brian Schmidt accepted the prize on behalf of both teams.

To learn more see: https://breakthroughprize.org/?controller=Page&action=news&news_id=21...

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Karin Öberg awarded the prestigious Packard fellowship

Karin Öberg awarded the prestigious Packard fellowship

October 15, 2014
Karin Öberg just won the prestigious Packard fellowship. Her citation reads: "Öberg is an astrochemist. She combines ice experiments and radio astronomy to explore the chemistry present during planet formation. This chemistry regulates the compositions and habitability of nascent planets, and is thus key to our understanding of the origins of life."

The Packard Foundation established the Fellowships program in 1988 to provide early-career...
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Visiting Program for PhD Students of the Harvard Astronomy Department at Carnegie Observatories, Pasadena

Visiting Program for PhD Students of the Harvard Astronomy Department at Carnegie Observatories, Pasadena

October 14, 2014

Following their first two years of study and research, PhD students from the Harvard Astronomy department may spend an extended period of time at the Carnegie Observatories in Pasadena. Any such visit should be included in the PhD thesis proposal of the students, and therefore must be approved by the Committee for Academic Studies (CAS) of the Harvard Astronomy department as well as the primary advisor of the student at Harvard.

Once a thesis proposal with such a visit gets approved, the progress made by each student will be monitored by the CAS and the student’s Thesis Advisory...

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Avi Loeb presents New Search Methods for Primitive and Intelligent Life Far from Earth

Avi Loeb presents New Search Methods for Primitive and Intelligent Life Far from Earth

September 24, 2014

On Tuesday, September 23, 2014, Avi opened the academic year's Science Series Public Lecture with an overview of current strategies for identifying evidence of life on other planets in the Milky Way galaxy and beyond. For a summary of the lecture please consult this report in the Harvard Crimson: http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2014/9/24/chair-astronomy-extraterrestrial-life/

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Phil Sadler Awarded IPS Technology and Innovation Award

Phil Sadler Awarded IPS Technology and Innovation Award

August 19, 2014

Phil Sadler was honored this week at the International Planetarium Society meeting in Beijing China. He received the 2014 Technology and Innovation Award.The award is given to recognize an individual or institution, “…whose technology and/or innovations in the planetarium field have been, through the years, utilized or replicated by other members and/or planetariums.” In 1977, Sadler invented the Starlab portable planetarium while a middle...

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Earth 2.0: NPR Radio Interview

Earth 2.0: NPR Radio Interview

August 11, 2014

"With hundreds of Earth-like planets discovered over the past few years, it’s fair to say we’re on the verge of finding alien life. Two new programs at NASA hope to find and analyze thousands more of these exoplanets, as they’re called.  Scientists working on the Transiting Exoplanet Surveying Satellite (TESS) and the James Webb Space Telescope say there’s a very real chance of finding extraterrestrial life within the next two decades. So, if we’re about to meet our extraterrestrial neighbors, let’s get to work on some opening lines. What if we’re really not...

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