The Astronomy Department is pleased to announce that the 2024 Mary Dailey Irvine Outstanding Thesis Prize goes to: Zach Webb (UMass)
His thesis was titled “New Insight into the Radial Distribution of Globular Clusters in Abell 2744 Using JWST” and his advisor was Prof. Kate Whitaker.
Please join us in congratulating Zach! This year we had a record number of theses submitted for the MDI prize and there were many excellent and deserving theses. The committee would like to acknowledge two runner ups who deserve honorable mention: Sophie Booth (UMass) and Jingyi Zhang (Smith). Well done Sophie and Jingyi!
Lastly, thank you to the committee who judged this year's theses: Bill Irvine, Katie Lester, Todd Tripp, Grant Wilson, James Lowenthal, Min Yun, and Daniel Wang. The committee had a very difficult task given the high quality of theses across the FCAD campuses.
Mary Dailey Irvine Prize
This prize is established through a gift from the Irvine Family to the Five College Astronomy Department in memory of Mary Dailey Irvine (Smith College 1922). This prize exists to encourage and honor excellent undergraduate research in astronomy and astrophysics. The prize is awarded to a graduating senior from one of the Five College institutions for an outstanding senior thesis or research paper presented to the department on an astronomical or astrophysical topic.