Background and Rules

The Rodger Doxsey Travel Prize—established through the support of his father, John Doxsey, and other friends, family, and colleagues—provides graduate students or postdocs within one year of receiving or receipt of their PhD a monetary prize to enable the oral presentation of their dissertation research at a winter meeting of the AAS. (Because nearly all dissertation talks are given at winter meetings and hardly any at summer meetings, the Doxsey Prize is awarded only for winter meetings.) The first awards were made for the 217th AAS meeting in Seattle, Washington, in January 2011.

Doxsey Prize Rules:

1. Applicants must be planning to present their dissertation research at a winter/January AAS meeting in the form of an oral dissertation talk; poster presenters and those giving regular, special session, invited, or other types of oral presentations may not apply for this prize.
2. Applicants' dissertation research must be in astronomy or a closely related discipline.
3. Applicants must be attending a North American university or have recently graduated from a North American university.
4. Applicants must submit their abstract by the "on-time" abstract submission deadline.
5. Advisors of the applicants must submit a letter indicating that the applicant is within one year of receiving or receipt of the PhD. These letters will be shared with the selection committee.
6. Winners will be selected by a committee of volunteers based on the scientific merit of the dissertation research as judged by the dissertation abstract. (Judges will be drawn from the broad AAS membership, not just those who work in your subject area and who might normally attend your session. With that in mind, please read Tips for Writing the Abstract of an AAS Meeting Presentation.)
7. The number of awards and size of each award will vary each year based on the amount of available funds, but the goal is to provide enough funding to cover a significant fraction of the expense for traveling to and attending a winter AAS meeting for 10% of the dissertation presenters at the meeting in question.
8. The award will be made in the form of a check to the recipient and a waiver of the registration fee for the meeting in question. The prize money is a travel stipend and may be used only to pay for meeting-related travel expenses (e.g., transportation, lodging, and meals).
9. In addition to naming winners, the judges may elect to name runners-up who will receive complimentary meeting registration but no travel stipend.

To Make a Donation

If you are an AAS member, please go to the Member Pages to make an online donation. After logging in, click on "Donate Now" in the left-hand menu column.

If you are not an AAS member, please send a check and cover letter directly to the American Astronomical Society, 2000 Florida Ave., NW, Suite 400, Washington, DC 20009. All donations are tax deductible, and you will receive a donation letter recognizing your contribution by 1 February of the year following receipt of your contribution.

Deadline

1 October for travel to present at winter/January meetings.

(The Doxsey Prize is not offered for summer meetings.)

Application

Applicants may apply for this prize during the Dissertation Talk abstract submission process. Please visit the submission site for the winter meeting at which you intend to present.

Recipients

219th Meeting — 8-12 January 2012, Austin, TX

Winners

• Sarah Ballard (Harvard University)
• Jonathan C. Bird (Ohio State University)
• Geoffrey Mathews (University of Hawaii)
• Ashley Pagnotta (Louisiana State University)
• Adric R. Riedel (Georgia State University)
• Barbara Denisse Rojas Ayala (Cornell University & American Museum of Natural History)
• Sumin Tang (Harvard University)
• Gail Zasowski (University of Virginia)

Honorable Mentions

• Antonela Monachesi (University of Michigan)
• Mubdi Rahman (University of Toronto)
• Izaskun San Roman (University of Florida)
• Erik J. Tollerud (University of California, Irvine)

217th Meeting — 9-13 January 2011, Seattle, WA

Winners

• Mia S. Bovill (University of Maryland)
• Ann Marie Cody (Caltech)
• Janet E. Colucci (University of California, Santa Cruz)
• Jacqueline Faherty (American Museum of Natural History)
• Roberto Galvan-Madrid (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics)
• Rodolfo Montez Jr. (Rochester Institute of Technology)
• Joseph Neilsen (Harvard University)
• Alex Parker (University of Victoria)
• Daniel A. Perley (University of California, Berkeley)
• Vithal Tilvi (Arizona State University)

Honorable Mentions

• Audra K. Hernandez (University of Florida)
• Jarron Leisenring (University of Virginia)
• Roman Shcherbakov (Harvard University)
• Adi Zolotov (New York University)
• John J. Tobin (University of Michigan)