2017 Dissertation Prize

2017 LAD Dissertation Prize Goes to Kyle Walker

The Laboratory Astrophysics Division (LAD) of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) is pleased to announce the recipient of its inaugural Dissertation Prize, given to an individual who has recently completed an outstanding theoretical or experimental doctoral dissertation in laboratory astrophysics. For 2017 the prize goes to Kyle Walker for his thesis “Molecular Collisional Excitation in Astrophysical Environments and Modeling the Early Universe.” Walker earned his PhD in physics at the University of Georgia and is now a postdoctoral research associate at Université du Havre, France.

Walker works at the interface of computational astrophysics and computational atomic and molecular physics, focusing on the molecular properties of interstellar environments. His doctoral research generated critical laboratory astrophysical data needed for modeling astrophysical environments that are not in local thermodynamic equilibrium.

The LAD Dissertation Prize includes a cash award, a framed certificate, and an invited lecture by the recipient at a meeting of the Laboratory Astrophysics Division.

Contacts:
Farid Salama
LAD Chair
NASA Ames Research Center, California
+1 (650) 604-3384
ladchair@aas.org

Daniel Wolf Savin
LAD Secretary
Columbia University, New York
+1 (212) 854-4124
ladsec@aas.org

Kyle Walker
Université du Havre, France
+33 (0)2 35 21 71 36
kyle.walker@univ-lehavre.fr

The AAS Laboratory Astrophysics Division (LAD, https://lad.aas.org) advances our understanding of the universe through the promotion of fundamental theoretical and experimental research into the underlying processes that drive the cosmos.

The American Astronomical Society (AAS, https://aas.org), established in 1899 and based in Washington, DC, is the major organization of professional astronomers in North America. The mission of the AAS is to enhance and share humanity’s scientific understanding of the universe.