Nicholas Hadley, Professor and Associate Chair of Undergraduate Studies, has been named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Election as a Fellow is an honor bestowed upon AAAS members by their peers.

This year 486 members have been awarded this honor by AAAS because of their scientifically or socially distinguished efforts to advance science or its applications. New Fellows will be presented with an official certificate and a gold and blue (representing science and engineering, respectively) rosette pin on Saturday, 14 February from 8 to 10 a.m. at the AAAS Fellows Forum during the 2009 AAAS Annual Meeting in Chicago.

As part of the Section on Physics, Dr. Hadley was elected as an AAAS Fellow for his leadership role in the discovery of the top quark and his contributions to searches for phenomena beyond the standard model of particle physics.

Dr. Hadley joined the University of Maryland as an Associate Professor in 1988. He is an experimental physicist working in the field of High Energy Physics (HEP). Skilled in the development and construction of detectors for the primary observation of charged and neutral particles, he has been very successful in data analysis and physics interpretation of HEP data. He did important work at Brookhaven on rare decays of “strange” particles, published the first paper at the Fermilab Dzero experiment on “leptoquarks,” and spearheaded the analysis efforts at Dzero that led to the discovery of the top quark at Dzero in 1995. He is internationally recognized for his many important leadership roles in the large collaboration of physicists and technical personnel that constitute an active HEP physics experiment, having been on the program advisory committees of Brookhaven and Fermilab, among other leadership positions

The tradition of AAAS Fellows began in 1874. Currently, members can be considered for the rank of Fellow if nominated by the steering groups of the Association’s 24 sections, or by any three Fellows who are current AAAS members (so long as two of the three sponsors are not affiliated with nominee’s institution) , or by the AAAS chief executive officer. For more information regarding the non-profit AAAS, visit www.aaas.org .

Associate Professor Bill Dorland was awarded the 2008 Richard A. Ferrell Distinguished Faculty Fellowship, which recognizes outstanding personal effort and expertise in physics, and dedicated service to the UMD Department of Physics . The Fellowship, established in 2001, honors Dr. Richard A. Ferrell, a deeply-respected physicist who joined the University in 1953, served 40 years, and remained active in the department even after his retirement. Dr. Ferrell died in 2005 at his nearby University Park home.

Dorland is a member of Maryland’s Plasma Physics research group, which US News and World Report ranked No. 2 in the nation. He has been a principal investigator for $8 million in research grants and is also the current Director of the Institute for Research in Electronics and Applied Physics.

In January, he will begin serving as the University Honors Director. For more information, please see, “Award Winning Physicist to Lead Honors Program,” on page 5 of The Advisor.

Assistant Professor Carter Hall has received the 2010 Richard A. Ferrell Distinguished Faculty Fellowship, which recognizes outstanding personal effort and expertise in physics, and dedicated service to the UMD Department of Physics . The Fellowship, established in 2001, honors Dr. Richard A. Ferrell, a deeply-respected physicist who joined the University in 1953, served 40 years, and remained active in the department even after his retirement. Dr. Ferrell died in 2005 at his nearby University Park home.

Professor Hall researches the fundamental nature of neutrino mass and the physics of dark matter.

An international research project conceived by University of Maryland physicist Eun-Suk Seo has discovered an unexpected surplus of cosmic ray high energy electrons that appear to come from a previously unidentified and relatively nearby cosmic source.

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The profile and article can be found at: www.pnas.org/content/105/43/16415.extract