2013 Outstanding Alumni
2013-10-11
Dr. Kara Hoffman
- BS 1992, University of Kentucky, Physics
- PhD 1998, Purdue University, Physics
Dr. Kara Hoffman was raised in Lexington, KY and received her B.S. degree in physics from the University of Kentucky in 1992. Under the direction of Professor Daniela Bortoletto, she completed her doctoral research on searches for new particles at the Collider Detector at Fermilab in 1998. She then moved to Geneva, Switzerland as a fellow at CERN where she worked on the OPAL experiment at the Large Electron Positron Collider. She returned to the U.S. as a research associate at the University of Chicago. In 2004, she left Chicago to commence a tenure track position at the University of Maryland, where her research has focused on high energy neutrino astrophysics. She was granted tenure in 2010 and currently serves as the director of the Center for Experimental Particle Physics at the University of Maryland.
Dr. John Monnier
- BS 1993, Purdue University, Physics
- PhD 1999, University of California at Berkeley, Physics
John Monnier received his B.S. in Physics from Purdue University in 1993 and subsequently attended graduate school at the University of California at Berkeley. After receiving his Physics PhD in 1999 working with Professor Charlie Townes and Dr. William Danchi on novel astronomical instrumentation, Dr. Monnier was awarded a Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics Fellowship where he led an effort to observe planet-forming disks around young stars using the technique of optical interferometry. In 2002, Dr. Monnier began a faculty job at the University of Michigan Astronomy Department, where he continues to build optical and infrared instruments, most notably the first interferometric combiner capable of imaging the surface features on nearby stars.