Sugarman Awards for research go to math undergraduate, physics graduate students

An undergraduate in mathematics and two graduate students in physics have received the 22nd annual Nathan Sugarman Awards for Student Research. The award recipients are presenting their research at 4:15 p.m. Monday, June 3, in the Laboratory for Astrophysics and Space Research.

Zihao Jiang, a third-year in mathematics, received the award “for his outstanding work in analyzing spectra of unidentified diffuse interstellar bands and setting up full pipeline reductions for a valuable archive of relevant spectra.” Jiang’s research adviser is Don York, the Horace B. Horton Professor in Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Matthew Becker, a graduate student in physics, received the award “for developing a novel algorithm of computing distortions of galaxy images using data from cosmological simulations, which significantly advances our ability to make realistic theoretical predictions for upcoming wide area surveys aiming to map matter distribution in the universe on large scales.” Becker’s research adviser is Andrey Kravtsov, professor in astronomy & astrophysics.

Samuel Meehan, a graduate student in physics, received the award “for his contributions to the ATLAS experiment at CERN in developing techniques to measure ZZ production with hadronic final states.” Meehan’s research adviser is Mark Oreglia, professor in physics.

Nathan Sugarman, SB’37, PhD’41, was a charter member of the Enrico Fermi Institute and a longtime professor in chemistry. He died in 1990.