UWAB Alum Aomawa Shields Earns Prestigious NSF Early Career Award

UWAB Alum Aomawa Shields, Ph.D., the Clare Boothe Luce Assistant Professor also in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of California, Irvine, was awarded $687,418 for the five year grant on her project titled CAREER: Bridging Theory and Observations of Habitable Worlds and Building a Bridge to Astronomy and Astrobiology for Underrepresented Middle-School Girls.

“I couldn’t be more honored to receive this NSF awards as it means we will break new ground globally in both science and education,” Shields shared. “We will be able to execute an interdisciplinary, multi-tiered research program bridging theory and observations of potentially habitable planets, and involve students and postdoctoral scholars in our efforts to target planets with the best prospects for hosting life in our corner of the Galaxy.”