Bloomberg Distinguished Professor Chuck Bennett, Professor Brice Ménard, and Associate Research Scientist Graeme Addison are part of the Euclid space telescope’s science team and will take part in the analysis of the mission’s data once collection begins.
News & Announcements Archive
Euclid Space Telescope is Go for Launch: July 1, 2023
The European Space Agency’s Euclid space telescope will launch from Kennedy Space Center on Saturday July 1. Bloomberg Professor Chuck Bennet, Professor Brice Ménard, and Associate Research Scientist Graeme Addison are part of the Euclid mission’s science team. Euclid will survey galaxies over the sky to determine the nature of the dark universe. This includes dark energy, which is currently driving an accelerated expansion of the universe, and dark matter, which is not made of atoms and does not interact with light. The central science goal of Euclid is to characterize and understand dark energy and dark matter more completely.
Launch Anniversary of the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe: June 30, 2001
June 30th marks the anniversary of the launch of the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), which started its nine-year mission in space on this date in 2001 to measure temperature differences across the sky in the cosmic microwave background. Bloomberg Distinguished Professor Chuck Bennett was the Principal Investigator of the mission. WMAP’s measurements were so exact that they form the foundation of the Standard Cosmological Model. In 2012, Bennett and the 26-person WMAP team was recognized by the Gruber Foundation’s 2012 Cosmology Prize for their transformative study of light from the infant universe. In 2018, the WMAP science team was also awarded a Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics
Julian Muñoz Named One of ScienceNews’ 10 Scientists to Watch
Theoretical physicist Julian Muñoz, who earned his PhD from the department in 2017, has been named to the SN 10: Scientists to Watch list from ScienceNews. Dr. Muñoz studies the universe’s early years, when the first stars began to shine and galaxies began to light up. He has developed a way to measure distances in that era, called a standard ruler.
Izze Hedricks, Grace Luettgen, Daniel Naiman, and Xin “Jason” Zhang Receive Undergraduate Research Recognition
The department is happy to announce a slew of outstanding achievements by undergraduate researchers: Grace Luettgen received an ASPIRE grant from the Dean’s Undergraduate Research Program to work with Prof. […]
Ziwei “Peter” Hu and Yiqi “Andrew” Liu Receive 2023 Donald E. Kerr Memorial Award
The department is pleased to announce that undergraduates Ziwei “Peter” Hu and Yiqi “Andrew” Liu are joint recipients of the 2023 Donald E. Kerr Memorial Award. The Kerr Award, established in 1979, acknowledges outstanding graduating physics majors who have distinguished themselves through their performance in the classroom, their accomplishments in research, and their other positive contributions to the department.
Several Graduate Students Receive Graduate Teaching Awards
The Graduate Program Committee is pleased to announce their selection of the most outstanding graduate student Teaching Assistants in the department with their annual graduate teaching awards. The recipients are: Excellence […]
Remembering Sam Durrance
Samuel Thornton Durrance, an astronomer who flew on two NASA space shuttle missions as a payload specialist, and who was a principal research scientist in the William H. Miller III Department of Physics and Astronomy from 1980 to 1997, died on May 5, 2023 at the age of 79. Dr. Durrance came to JHU in 1980, as one of the first team members on the Hopkins Ultraviolet Telescope (HUT) project led by Prof. Arthur Davidsen. HUT had been selected for development by NASA in 1978, with the intent of making multiple flights on the space shuttle. Durrance was a key player in the construction and testing of HUT and in 1984 was selected as one of two payload specialists to fly with the telescope.
Alex Szalay Elected Member of the National Academy of Sciences
Bloomberg Distinguished Professor Alex Szalay has been elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences. Szalay is among 143 members who have been elected to the NAS in 2023 in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research.
Remembering Brian R. Judd, Professor Emeritus
Professor Chia-Ling Chien prepared the following remembrance of Brian R. Judd, Gerhard H. Dieke Professor Emeritus, who passed away on April 8, 2023.
I was saddened to hear that Brian Judd had passed away.
Long before I met Brian Judd, he was already famous during my thesis research in the 1970’s. I studied his theoretical papers on angular momentum and hyperfine interactions. To many physicists Brian Judd has been known as the “Angular Momentum Judd” in part because of his book Angular Momentum Theory for Diatomic Molecules.
After I came to Hopkins, I made an appointment to see him in Rowland Hall, now Krieger Hall. I had no idea how intimating the revered physicist might be. To my relieve, Brian was mild manner, tall and handsome, soft-spoken, in jacket and tie, a true English Gentleman.