The winners of the 2019 Pierazzo International Student Travel Award established by the Planetary Science Institute have been selected. 

The Pierazzo International Student Travel Award was established by PSI in memory of Senior Scientist Betty Pierazzo to support and encourage graduate students to build international collaborations and relationships in planetary science.

Ying (Katherina) Feng of the University of California, Santa Cruz will receive the award for a U.S.-based graduate student traveling to a planetary meeting outside the U.S. Her research title is “Probing the Phase Dependence of Atmospheric Inference for Hot Jupiters” and she will be attending the Exoclimes V conference at Oxford, the United Kingdom, Aug. 12-15, 2019.

 

Sammy Griffin of the University of Glasgow will receive the award for a non-U.S.-based graduate traveling to a planetary meeting within the U.S. Her research title is “New Insights into the Magmatic and Shock History of the Naklite Meteorites from Electron Backscatter Diffraction” and she will be attending the 50th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Houston, Texas. March 18-22, 2019.

A PSI representative will present each awardee with a certificate and check for $2,000 at their respective conferences. 

Betty Pierazzo was an expert in the area of impact modeling throughout the solar system, as well as an expert on the astrobiological and environmental effects of impacts on Earth and Mars. In addition to her research, she was passionate about education, teaching and public outreach, developing planetary-related classroom materials, professional development workshops for teachers, and teaching college-level classes herself. Betty believed in the strength of broad collaborations in all of her research and education activities. This award memorializes the scope of how she lived her life and the good she sought to bring to our profession and communities. 

To contribute to the Betty Pierazzo Memorial fund, please go to: http://www.psi.edu/support/pierazzofund 

To learn more about Betty Pierazzo please go to: http://www.psi.edu/about/memorial/betty.html