News: Faculty Awards

Early-career scholars recognized for pioneering work in statistics, physics, chemistry, astrophysics, and computer science.

UChicago chemist Laura Gagliardi was honored for groundbreaking work in theoretical and computational chemistry.

The prestigious Einstein Medal, established in 1979, honors individuals who have contributed significant scientific findings, works, or publications related to Albert Einstein.

Fred Chong, Seymour Goodman Professor of Computer Science, has been named an ACM Fellow for his groundbreaking work in quantum computer architecture, compilation, and optimization.

Yamuna Krishnan, the Louis Block Professor of Chemistry and the College, has received the 2025 Marian and Stuart Rice Research Award. The Divisional honor provides unrestricted seed funds for intellectually exciting and innovative research ventures that enable new research directions.

Krishnan has pioneered the application of DNA nanotechnology to cell biology, deploying nanodevices as fluorescent reporters, thereby revealing the chemistry within sub-compartments of cells called organelles.

Prof. Wendy Freedman, one of world’s leading cosmologists, has been awarded the National Medal of Science, the country’s highest scientific honor. She was recognized for her pioneering contributions to cosmology, including the measurement of the expansion and evolution of the universe.

Photo by Ryan K. Morris, courtesy of the National Science & Technology Medals Foundation

Two PSD faculty members have received named professorships. Hening Lin has been named the James and Karen Frank Family Professor in the Departments of Medicine and Chemistry and the College, and Rebecca Willett has been named the first Worah Family Professor in the Wallman Society of Fellows in the Departments of Statistics and Computer Science and the College.

Congratulations to Wendy Freedman for being named one of Nature’s 10! She is recognized for her pioneering work on Hubble constant measurements. 

Six University of Chicago Physical Sciences Division scientists were named in Web of Science's 2024 report of highly cited researchers. According to Web of Science, researchers on the list have demonstrated significant and broad influence in their fields.
 

Professor Emeritus James Norris received the inaugural "Spin Chemistry Lifetime Achievement Award" from the ESR Spectroscopy group of the Royal Society of Chemistry. This award is designed to honor scientists who have made groundbreaking contributions to the field of spectroscopy.

UChicago Professor of Computer Science Rebecca Willett is the 2024 recipient of the SIAM Activity Group on Data Science Career Prize, for “her work in physics-informed machine learning and data science and for her service and leadership in the data science community.”

Astronomy and Astrophysics Asst. Prof. Austin Joyce has been selected for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Early Career Research Program. Prof. Joyce will use this opportunity to apply cosmological quantum field theory to understand how the universe evolved and acquired its structure.

Two UChicago faculty members were recognized as 2024 APS Fellows. Prof. Tiffany Shaw was selected for her contributions to atmospheric dynamics and its response to climate change, while Asst. Prof. Alex Drlica-Wagner was honored for his work in observational cosmology, including groundbreaking research in dark matter science.

The David and Lucile Packard Foundation announced today the 2024 class of Packard Fellows for Science and Engineering, including UChicago assistant professor of physics Zoe Yan. This year’s class features 20 innovative early-career scientists and engineers who will each receive $875,000 over five years to pursue their research. This year’s class of Fellows is pushing the boundaries of science and innovation in their fields of study, from advances in detecting and treating serious diseases to understanding how species react to changing climates to energy-efficient electronics. 

Congrats to John Jumper, SM'12, PhD'17, who was awarded a share of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work creating an AI model called AlphaFold that predicts the structures of proteins. 

Jumper studied with Karl Freed, Henry G. Gale Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Chemistry and member of the James Franck Institute; and Tobin Sosnick, William B. Graham Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and member of the Institute for Biophysical Dynamics.

Jumper becomes the 100th scholar associated with UChicago to receive a Nobel Prize!