News

2023

Congratulations Diego Garza and Congratulations Aster Taylor

April 5, 2023

Diego Garza (Physics, Astrophysics, 2023) and Aster Taylor (Astrophysics, 2023) won the  NSF Graduate Research Fellowship.


New calibration of the ‘red giant method’ improves measurement of the Hubble constant

April 3, 2023

In a new paper in Nature Astronomy, Taylor Hoyt –who received his Ph.D from UChicago in 2022 and is currently a researcher in Berkeley Lab’s Physics Division – presents a new approach to calibrating the measurement of the universe’s present day expansion rate.


Congratulations to Dr. Adina Feinstein

March 21, 2023

Congratulations to Adina Feinstein for successfully defending her Ph.D. dissertation on “Young Stellar and Planetary Systems from the UV to the IR”.


Congratulations to Alex Drlica-Wagner

March 1, 2023

Congratulations to Alex Drlica-Wagner, who has been promoted from Assistant Professor to Associate Professor, part-time, in the Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics.


Robert Rosner named a 2022 AAAS fellow

February 28, 2023

Robert Rosneris a theoretical physicist who since 1987 has been on the faculty of the University of Chicago, where he is the William E. Wrather Distinguished Service Professor in the departments of Astronomy & Astrophysics and Physics, as well as in the Enrico Fermi Institute, and the Harris School of Public Policy. 


“Six University of Chicago researchers named 2023 Sloan Fellows”, UChicago News

February 15, 2023

Irina Zhuravleva, a Clare Boothe Luce assistant professor in the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, has earned a prestigious Sloan Research Fellowship.


The Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society has selected Richard G. Kron’s collaborative research project for 2023–2024

February 14, 2023

“Capturing the Stars: Women’s Networks and the Advancement of Science at Yerkes Observatory, 1895–1940”, Richard G. Kron (Astronomy and Physics), Kristine Palmieri (Institute on the Formation of Knowledge), Andrea Twiss-Brooks (The University of Chicago Library), Emily Kern (History).


Prof. Michael Gladders is the 2022-2023 recipient of the Marian and Stuart Rice Research Award

February 8, 2023

Prof. Michael Gladders is the 2022-2023 recipient of the Marian and Stuart Rice Research Award, a U. Chicago Physical Sciences Divisional honor that provides funding for intellectually exciting and innovative research ventures that enables new directions of research.


Erik Shirokoff, astronomer who built instruments to map the universe, 1979-2023

February 3, 2023

Assoc. Prof. Erik Shirokoff, a University of Chicago astronomer who built instruments to understand the earliest ages of the universe, died Jan. 26. He was 43.


“Scientists release newly accurate map of all the matter in the universe”, UChicago News

February 2, 2023

Analysis combines Dark Energy Survey, South Pole Telescope data to understand evolution of universe


A coherent story of the Universe from galaxy and CMB surveys

January 31, 2023

Combining data from the Dark Energy Survey and the South Pole Telescope, scientists piece together a coherent story of the Universe from galaxy and CMB surveys. These are some of the most stringent tests of the standard cosmological model using cross-correlations of independent data sets.


“Robert Rosner, 2023 APS President, Takes the Helm”, APS News

January 28, 2023

Robert Rosner likes big questions.
How could nuclear power help humanity in a warming climate? How can physicists better explain their work to the public? And why are magnetic fields… well, everywhere? “The nerve of them, being so ubiquitous,” he says.


“NASA’s TESS Discovers Planetary System’s Second Earth-Size World”, www.nasa.gov

January 11, 2023

Using data from NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, scientists have identified an Earth-size world, called TOI 700 e, orbiting within the habitable zone of its star – the range of distances where liquid water could occur on a planet’s surface. The world is 95% Earth’s size and likely rocky.


“UChicago graduate turns their fascination with space into children’s book about aliens”, by Jessica Guo, UChicago News

January 10, 2023

Joalda Morancy, who studied astronomy and astrophysics, takes readers on journey through solar system and beyond


“Meet astronomy and astrophysics student, Mandy Chen”, PSD News

January 5, 2023

Mandy Chen was born and raised in Guizhou Province, Southwest China. Before coming to the University of Chicago she was studying at the University of Hong Kong, where she got bachelor’s and master’s degrees in physics and astronomy. This is her fifth year as a PhD student in astronomy and astrophysics. Her research focuses on observations of the diffuse circumgalactic medium—the outermost envelopes of galaxies. She says she “seeks to better understand the dynamical state of this diffuse gas, and its connection to the star-formation/supermassive blackhole activities of galaxies and the cosmic baryon cycle in general.”