Tim Minella '09 receives American Astronomical Society student award.

Tim Minella '09, a double major in government and physics, was honored with the Chambliss Astronomy Achievement Student Award by the American Astronomical Society (AAS) in January of 2009. These awards are given to recognize exemplary research by undergraduate and graduate students who present at one of the poster sessions at the meetings of the AAS. Minella presented results of his research at the 213th meeting in Long Beach, California, in January 2009.

Minella's research, performed with Assistant Professor of Physics Natalia Connolly and Dr. Brian Connolly of the University of Pennsylvania (also a Scholar-in-Residence at Hamilton), investigated the use of an advanced statistical technique called sequential analysis for the next generation of large-scale cosmology experiments.

Many of these experiments will collect large samples of so-called Type Ia supernovae, which are crucial for understanding the expansion history of the universe and the nature of the mysterious dark energy that drives it according to current theory.