A researcher at Queen’s University Belfast has won ‘The Young Astronomer Award 2008’ from the Astronomical Society of Japan.
Dr Hideko Nomura, 35, was presented with the award in recognition of her outstanding research achievements and contribution to astronomy over the past five years, including her part in a $800m telescopic project in Chile
She won the prize for her work on developing physical and chemical models of massive star-forming cores and proto-planetary disks around low mass stars.
Her models will provide observational diagnostics for revealing star formation and planet formation processes for the ALMA (Atacama Large Millimetre/submillimetre Array) interferometer in Chile. An interferometer is made up of separate telescopes which combine their signals to obtain the angular resolution of a much larger telescope.
ALMA is a joint US - European - Japanese project to build over 60 12 metre telescopes at an altitude of 5,000m in the Atacama Desert and will cost around $800m by the time that it is fully operational in 2012.
As a research fellow funded by the Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science, Dr Nomura has worked closely with Professor Tom Millar in the Astrophysics Research Centre in the School of Maths and Physics at Queen’s.
She also worked with him at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology as postdoctoral fellow.
Dr Nomura said: "I have had a very fruitful time at Queen's University. My experience will have a great impact on my future work in Japan."
Professor Millar said Dr Nomura was highly deserving of the award: “Hideko’s work over the past five years has been aimed at solving some of the most fundamental problems in astronomy today and has resulted in a number of seminal publications. Her work in Queen’s has done much to establish the molecular astrophysics group here.”
Her prize, which includes a medal and a cheque, was awarded at a ceremony during the annual spring meeting of the Astronomical Society of Japan in Tokyo.
In May she will take up a lectureship in the Department of Astronomy at Kyoto University, where she previously studied.
Notes to editors
This award, made annually to Japanese astronomers under the age of 36, is in recognition of her outstanding research achievement and her significant contribution to astronomy over the past five years.
For media enquiries please contact: Andrea Clements, Press and PR Unit,+44 (0)28 90 97 5391, Mob 07980 013 362, a.clements@qub.ac.uk