C19. Astrophysics

Recent Prizes in Astrophysics and Related Topics

The Peter Gruber Foundation Award in Cosmology in 2006 will be announced
in April and presented at the 26th General Assembly of the International
Astronomical Union in Prague in August {can one have some sort of cross
reference to the meeting announcement on another page??}

The 2005 Award was presented to James E. Gunn of Princeton University
for his contributions to cosmology and astrophysics, including the first
discussion of weak gravitational lensing, the absorption of quasar light
by intergalactic gas (the Gunn-Peterson effect), and his leadership of
the Sloan Digital Sky Survey of large scale structure in the universe.

The 2004 Award was presented to Alan Guth and Andrei Linde for their
formulation and development of the concept of the early universe called
inflation.

This is an annual award, currently set at $150,000. Nominations for
2007 will be accepted until mid-2006. See www.petergruberfoundation.org
for instructions on how to nominate a candidate.

The 2005 Crafoord Award in astronomy was presented by the Swedish Academy
of Sciences was presented to P. James E. Peebles, James E. Gunn (both
Princeton), and Martin J. Rees (Lord Rees of Ludlow, Cambridge University
UK) for fundamental contributions to cosmology and astrophysics.

The Balzan Foundation Prize in observational astronomy and astrophysics for
2006 will be presented later in the year. An astronomy/astrophysics
related topic is featured every 3-5 years.

The million-dollar Shaw Prize in Astronomy for 2005 went to Geoffrey Marcy
(U. California, Berkeley, USA) and Michel Mayor (Observatory de Geneve,
Switzerland) for the discovery and characterization of planets orbiting
other stars.