The Research Corporation for Science Advancement has named the University of Chicago's Michael Gladders a 2009 Cottrell Scholar. Each of the 10 new Cottrell Scholars will receive a $100,000 grant.
Cottrell award recipients are chosen both for the quality of their scientific research and their dedication to teaching. The awards are named for Frederick Gardner Cottrell, whose generosity made the Research Corporation possible, and whose invention of the electrostatic precipitator was an early environmental innovation that reduced pollution from smokestacks.
Gladders, an Assistant Professor in Astronomy & Astrophysics, is constructing the largest-ever catalog of distance groups and clusters of galaxies. The formation of these objects over cosmic time is driven by dark matter and dark energy, and these catalogs will be used to test the properties of these engimatic but dominant components of the universe. He plans to use emerging technologies to bring this new astronomical research into the University's classrooms.
He will incorporate data from an extensive imaging survey of the faint sky into advanced computer programs for teaching and visualization, enhancing the capabilities of these desktop planetaria. Based on these and other new tools, Gladders will create new computerized astronomy labs for use in undergraduate courses.
Founded in 1912, the Research Corporation of Tucson, Ariz., is an advocate for the sciences and a major funder of scientific innovation and research in U.S. colleges and universities.
—Prof. Chuan He
