UH Mānoa graduate wins prestigious Trumpler Award again

University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
Contact:
Louise H Good, (808) 381-2939
Editor/Media Contact, Institute for Astronomy
Dr. H. Jabran Zahid, (617) 495-7505
Clay Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Posted: Jul 13, 2015

H. Jabran Zahid
H. Jabran Zahid

For the second year in a row, a graduate of the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa’s Institute for Astronomy (IfA) has received the Robert J. Trumpler Award, given by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific to recognize a recent PhD thesis considered unusually important to astronomy. The 2015 recipient is Dr. H. Jabran Zahid, who received his PhD in 2014.

Zahid’s thesis work measured the chemical evolution of galaxies using existing and new data from large extragalactic surveys, and compared these results with the predictions of cosmological simulations. Highly motivated to understand his observational results from a theoretical perspective, he extended this work by developing the theoretical links between galactic chemical evolution, dust and star formation in galaxies.

Said IfA Director Guenther Hasinger, “Jabran embarked on his PhD thesis with extraordinary drive, innate ability and independence. His thesis work yielded nine first-author refereed journal articles that comprehensively span observations and theory, and has already been cited by other researchers over 250 times.”

Zahid is now a Clay Postdoctoral Fellow at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. The 2014 recipient was Dr. Brendan P. Bowler, who is now a postdoctoral fellow at the California Institute of Technology, Joint Center for Planetary Astronomy.

Founded in 1967, the Institute for Astronomy at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa conducts research into galaxies, cosmology, stars, planets, and the sun. Its faculty and staff are also involved in astronomy education, deep space missions, and in the development and management of the observatories on Haleakala and Maunakea. The Institute operates facilities on the islands of Oʻahu, Maui, and Hawaiʻi.

Since its humble beginnings over 125 years ago, the Astronomical Society of the Pacific has evolved into one of the most recognized and well-respected nonprofit astronomy organizations in the country. For more information about the ASP, www.astrosociety.org.

For more information, visit: http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/info/press-releases/Zahid_Trumpler/