JQSRT Young Scientist Award in Quantitative Spectroscopy

Quantitative Spectroscopy is one of three focus areas of JQSRT, along with Radiative Transfer and Light Scattering. Since 2007, the three Editors-in-Chief of JQSRT have been working closely with Elsevier Publisher José Stoop to identify the best young researchers who have contributed to their respective fields.  This brand new award was established to acknowledge the contributions from talented young researchers.  Traditionally these Awards are presented during a conference related to one of the three focus areas of the Journal.  The criteria for the award includes having a publication of at least one significant paper in JQSRT, and a presentation at the conference in question.

We have recently awarded two Young Scientists with Awards for their work in Quantitative Spectroscopy at the 21st Colloquium on High Resolution Molecular Spectroscopy (31 August – 4 September 2009, Castellammare di Stabia, Italy).  This year the pool of eligible qualified candidates was extensive.  The chairs of the meeting, Michel Herman, Martin Quack, and Gianfranco Di Lonardo, with the Editor-in-Chief of JQSRT, carefully considered the credentials of all available candidates, and chose two outstanding young scientists.  First-place was presented to Dr. Ha Tran, who was awarded EUR500 and a certificate by Editor-in-Chief Dr. Laurence S. Rothman.  The runner-up award was won by Dr. Lorenzo Lodi.

Winner of the Young Scientist Award:

Dr. Tran is a young woman originally from Viet Nam who has already co-authored quite a number of papers in JQSRT. Her research specialty is in
the theory of line shapes of molecular transitions and the dynamics of collisions.  She is also an expert on line coupling effects.  Her work has, and will have, a very big impact on atmospheric retrievals, and
also the molecular absorption databases.  Dr. Tran is in the group of Prof. Jean-Michel Hartman at the Universities Paris 12 and Paris 7.

Runner Up:

Dr. Lodi graduated in Materials Science from the University of Milan Bicocca and then obtained a PhD in physics from University College London, where he is now working as a post-doc in the group of Prof. Jonathan Tennyson (an Associate Editor of JQSRT).  Dr. Lodi's research area is to theoretically obtain very accurate structure information of molecules, and he has applied new techniques to the H2O molecule, even beyond dissociation.  Characterizing water vapor is of course extremely important for many applications.  This work will hopefully be a paradigm for other molecules.

On behalf of Elsevier and all Editors-in-Chief, we congratulate these two young researchers and hope to see their continued success in the field in years to come.

Dr. Laurence S. Rothman, Editor-in-Chief, JQSRT Quantitative Spectroscopy

José Stoop, Publisher, JQSRT Elsevier