Student Awards
Graduate Student Awards 2022
Charles F. Hooper Jr. Memorial Award
This award is made annually to senior graduate students in physics who have shown distinction in research and/or teaching. The Award honors the memory of Professor Charles (“Chuck”) Hooper, who made seminal contributions to the Department as a Chair, a distinguished researcher, and a beloved mentor/teacher. The 2022 recipients are Keegan Gunther, Gustavo Perez-Sanchez, and Landen Conway.
Keegan was asked to teach PHY2054 for the 2022 Summer. Despite this being his first appointment as an instructor, Keegan received outstanding student evaluations, which lauded his enthusiasm for teaching the course material and his personal touch in offering genuine encouragement and empathy.
Gustavo consistently performs TA duties at an exemplary level for both large lecture courses and the smaller PHPB sections. PHY2054 students, in particular, rate Gustavo among the top of those TAs assigned to the course, according to an anonymous and optional student survey.
Landen’s performance as a teaching assistant for PHY2054 has been excellent, in terms of attending to his responsibilities, such as quiz authoring and grading on time, and working with the students to help them break down and understand the subject material. Students in PHY2054 have rated Landen among the top TAs assigned to the course.
Wayne R. Bomstad II Memorial Award
is given annually to two physics teaching assistants who have demonstrated excellence in teaching. One award is usually given for laboratory teaching, and a second award recognizes teaching in discussion sections. The awards honor the memory of Wayne Bomstad, a valued graduate student teaching team member. The 2022 laboratory award went to Soumitra Ganguly, who, as explained by his nominator Dr. Robert Deserio, knows how to connect with his students and handle their questions quickly and clearly with a good sense of humor. The discussion session award went to David Sadek, whom Dr. Kathryn McGill nominated. David has been an enthusiastic participant in TA training for three semesters and an invaluable mentor to new TAs in the later semesters of training.
Tom Scott Memorial Award
This award is made annually to a senior graduate student in experimental physics who has shown distinction in research. The award honors the memory of Professor Tom Scott, who made significant contributions to the Department as a Chair and noted researcher. The 2022 recipient is Tanmaya Mishra (nominated by Professor Klimenko). Tanmaya is leading research on the astrophysics of high-mass black hole systems and Artificial Intelligence (AI) applications to detect GW signals. He developed the most sensitive artificial intelligence algorithm for signal detection, enhancing the UF leadership in the LSC (LIGO Scientific Collaboration) data analysis.
E. Raymond Andrew Memorial Award
This award is given to a senior graduate student in physics for distinction in research. The award honors Professor Raymond Andrew, a world-renowned physicist particularly noted for his seminal contributions to the field of magnetic resonance imaging. Professor Andrew was a Graduate Research Professor in the Department from 1983 until 1998. The 2022 recipient is Alex Roman. Nominated by Professor Matchev, Alex is starting his 5th year at UF and will graduate in the summer of 2022. He became an expert in machine learning and AI. In his research, he creatively applies modern AI techniques for data analysis of particle physics and spectroscopic data.
See the feature article about Alex’s current research and plans for the future in this issue: Graduate Student Profile: Alex Roman
Spring 2023 CLAS Dissertation Fellowship Recipients
Each fall, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CLAS) awards approximately fifteen one-semester dissertation fellowships to deserving graduate students whose projects are judged by the selection committee to be highly meritorious. Successful applicants receive a stipend and paid tuition during the following spring semester. The following physics graduate students have been selected to receive this prestigious award for Spring 2023.
Nathaniel Strauss (Bernard Whiting, advisor) and Ammar Jahin (Yuxuan Wang, advisor) have each been awarded the CLAS Dissertation Fellowship, funded by the Charles Vincent and Heidi Cole McLaughlin Endowment in the amount of $8,000.
Exoplanets Research Team Wins Machine Learning Data Challenge
The UF Physics exoplanets research team wins the Ariel Machine Learning Data Challenge, an official event at this year’s NeurIPS (Neural Information Processing Systems) conference (https://nips.cc/). More than 200 international teams were registered for this competition, which went through several elimination rounds before only the top teams in each track were invited for the final round. The UF team, aptly named “Gators,” won FIRST PLACE in the regular track and finished second in the light track. The team consisted of three physics graduate students: Alex Roman, Eyup Unlu, and Roy Forestano, supervised by two Physics faculty (Konstantin Matchev and Katia Matcheva). The win comes with a $2,500 cash prize. In addition, the team was invited to present the winning solution at the NeurIPS conference and to co-author the resulting paper in the proceedings.
Physics Undergraduates Win First Place in AI Hackathon
UF Physics undergraduate students Sydnee O’Donnell and Oscar Barrera won first place in UF’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) Days 24-hour Hackathon! As part of UF’s AI Days initiative, teams were assigned the task of developing a software application to develop a solution for greater global awareness and sustainable literacy by addressing one or more of the sustainable development goals (SDG). For their project, Sydnee and Oscar used 2016 Boston census data, which looked more in-depth at disadvantaged populations. With a k-means clustering algorithm, they found the regions of Boston most in need of additional infrastructures – such as community centers and public schools. For an in-depth look at their project, visit K-Boston Analysis.
