2015 Rodger Doxsey Travel Prize Results Are In!

The Rodger Doxsey Travel Prize — established through the support of his father, John Doxsey, and other friends, family, and colleagues — provides graduate students and 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. The first awards were made for the 217th AAS meeting in Seattle, Washington, in January 2011.

More than 140 dissertation abstracts were received for the upcoming 225th AAS meeting in Seattle, WA, and more than 70% of them were entered into the 2015 Doxsey prize competition. Choosing only a small number of these to win the prize from among so many worthy applications was not easy.

The judges selected 10 Doxsey prize winners and 5 honorable mentions. All will receive complimentary registration for the Seattle meeting. The prize winners will also receive a modest stipend to help pay their travel expenses. Winners and honorable mentions came from a diverse group of institutions, backgrounds, and geographical locations.

Following are the 2015 Doxsey prize winners and honorable mentions — please tell them congratulations if you see them at the meeting!

Winners (PhD Institution)

• Sirio Belli (Caltech)
• Behnam Darvish (Univ. of California, Riverside)
• James Davenport (Univ. of Washington)
• Brian Friesen (Univ. of Oklahoma)
• Korey Haynes (George Mason Univ.)
• Myoungwon Jeon (Univ. of Texas, Austin)
• Claude Mack (Vanderbilt Univ.)
• Brett McGuire (Caltech)
• Katherine Rabidoux (West Virginia Univ.)
• Aomawa Shields (Univ. of Washington)

Honorable Mentions (PhD Institution)

• Camille Avestruz (Yale Univ.)
• Lauren Cleeves (Univ. of Michigan)
• Tyler Desjardins (Univ. of Western Ontario)
• Daniel Foreman-Mackey (New York Univ.)
• Jordan Mirocha (Univ. of Colorado)

Much gratitude goes out to this year’s volunteer Doxsey prize judges for their earnest efforts:

• Jennifer Bartlett (US Naval Observatory)
• Jennifer L. Hoffman (Univ. of Denver)
• Djazia Ladjal (Gemini Observatory)
• Roger Malina (Univ. of Texas, Dallas)
• Jake Noel-Storr (InsightSTEM, Inc.)
• Jay Strader (Michigan State Univ.)