On Friday, November 5th, President Obama named 85 researchers as recipients of the Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers , the highest honor bestowed by the United States government on science and engineering professionals in the early stages of their independent research careers. Among the scientists honored were ten Sloan Research Fellows . The awards, established by President Clinton in 1996, are coordinated by the Office of Science and Technology Policy within the Executive Office of the President. Awardees are selected for their pursuit of innovative research at the frontiers of science and technology and their commitment to community service as demonstrated through scientific leadership, public education, or community outreach. Winning scientists and engineers have received research grants for up to five years to further their studies in support of critical government missions. A list of Sloan Research Fellows included among this year's winners appears below. Fellow Discipline SRF Year Scott J. Aaronson Computer Science 2009 Amy N. Finkelstein Economics 2007 Andrew A. Houck Physics 2009 Manolis Kellis Computational & Evolutionary Molecular Biology 2008 Joshua W. Shaevitz Physics 2008 Doris Y. Tsao Neuroscience 2009 Jacob G. Wacker Physics 2010 Haoxing Xu Neuroscience 2009 Martin T. Zanni Chemistry 2006 Martin W. Zwierlein Physics 2008 The Foundation congratulates all 85 of this year's winners of the Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers.
On September 27th, President Obama named seven prominent researchers as recipients of this year's National Medal of Science, the highest honor the U.S. government bestows on scholars in the sciences and engineering. Among this year's recipients are two former Sloan Research Fellows, chemist Jacqueline Barton from the California Institute of Technology, who received a Sloan Research Fellowship in 1984, and mathematician Srinivasa Varadhan of New York University, who received a Sloan Research Fellowship in 1969. According to the White House press release, Barton was recognized for "for [the] discovery of a new property of the DNA helix, long-range electron transfer, and for showing that electron transfer depends upon stacking of the base pairs and DNA dynamics. Her experiments reveal a strategy for how DNA repair proteins, locate DNA lesions, and demonstrate a biological role for DNA-mediated charge transfer." Varadhan received the honor "for his work in probability theory, especially his work on large deviations from expected random behavior, which has revolutionized this field of study during the second half of the twentieth century and become a cornerstone of both pure and applied probability. The mathematical insights he developed have been applied in diverse fields including quantum field theory, population dynamics, finance, econometrics, and traffic engineering." Also among this year's receipients is Dr. Richard Tapia, an engineering professor at Rice University. Dr. Tapia is a grantee in the Foundation's Education for Underrepresented Groups program, and has spearheaded Rice's impressive efforts to recruit more students from underrepresented minorities into graduate programs in STEM fields and to support these students throughout their studies. In addition to his scholarly work on optimization theory and numerical analysis, the White House mentions Dr. Tapia's work fostering diversity as a reason for his selection for the National Medal of Science. The Sloan Foundation congratulates Dr. Barton, Dr. Varadhan, and Dr. Tapia for this well-deserved recognition and is proud to have had the opportunity to support the important work of such high caliber scholars.
