Joint Center for Astrophysics

JCA Info
News
Mission
Research
Publications
Personnel
Employment
Funding
Reports
[For Internal Use]
Computing
Forms & Docs
Useful Links

JCA Facilities
Telescope

JCA Education
U/graduate
Graduate

JCA Outreach etc
Press
Open Houses
Getting here

2005 Annual Report

Index: Personnel | Research | Programmatic | Publications

I. Personnel

(i) JCA Comings & goings

Mark Henriksen stepped down as JCA Director at the end of June 2005,

and the JCA board appointed Ian M George as his successor, effective 2005 July 01. NASA/GSFC recognized this change and switched George as PI on the grant on 2005 Oct 26.

There have been several resignations of JCA members over the year. Happily, in most cases these have been the result of members obtaining (often more permanent) positions either at NASA/GSFC or elsewhere. These members were Kip Kuntz (left in February to join Johns Hopkins University), Igor Moskalenko (June to become a Senior Research Scientist at Stanford University), Julie McEnery (August) & Padi Boyd Patricia Boyd (November) both of whom became Civil Servants at NASA/GSFC, and Dirk Petry (December to start a position at Iowa State University). Dirk Pety

These are clearly success stories, whereby the JCA provided a crucial stepping-stone in that person's professional development. However the (sole) accounting assistant for the JCA, Rose Ray, also decided to accept a position in Public Services in Anne Arundal County. Unfortunately her decision to seek employment elsewhere was directly related to the on-going uncertainity in the future CAN.

(ii) JCA Promotions

There were no promotions of JCA personel based at GSFC during 2005, although internal-JCA reviews are under-way in the case of Volker Beckmann and James Chiang.

Of the people affiliated to the JCA at UMBC, Markos Georganopoulos Eric Perlman Drs Markos Georganopoulos, and Eric Perlman were promoted (to Assistant and Associate Ressearch Professor, respectively).

Alexis Finoguenov At the Nov Faculty meeting, the UMBC Physics Dept appointed Dr. Alexis Finogeunov (Max Planck Institut für extraterrestrische Physik) an Adjunct Assistant Professor at UMBC.

(iii) JCA Visitors

The JCA hosted a number of visitors during 2005 (although none funded directly through the JCA). Alexis Finogeunov continued his regular collaborative & productive visits with Drs Mark Henriksen & Dave Davis.

UMBC also hosted a short (1 week) visit by Dr. Grigor Amasov (Moscow State Univ.) in the fall for collaboration with Drs Mark Henriksen, Dave Davis & Alexis Finogeunov.

Kirpal Nandra Dr. Kirpal ('Paul') Nandra (Imperial College, London) also visited Drs Ian George & T.Jane Turner for a month in the fall.

(iv) JCA Education Activities

PHYS305	PHYS315
PHYS316	PHYS415

At the undergraduate level, JCA members taught 4 courses at UMBC in 2005.

Two UMBC undergraduate students (John Koempel< & Caroline Raley) were JCA summer interns within NASA/Code 660 in 2005, and a third undergraduate student (Kushal Mehta) worked at UMBC, but was not funded directly through the JCA.

Deatrick Foster Alex Padgett

Brian Wingert Jianning Zeng

There are four graduate students advised by JCA faculty (Deatrick Foster, Alex Padgett, Brian Wingert, & Jianning Zeng), but only Jianning Zeng was funded directly through the JCA. Brian Wingert was also a summer intern at NASA/Code 660 in 2005, funded directly by UMBC.

PHYS631 PHYS632

Two (new) Graduate courses were approved by the UMBC Graduate Council. The first of these will be taught in 2006 Spring, the second in 2006 Fall.

Index: Personnel | Research | Programmatic | Publications