Tod R. Lauer | |
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| Born | 1957 (age 67–68)[citation needed] Ohio, United States[citation needed] |
| Alma mater | Caltech UC Santa Cruz |
| Awards | NASA Medal for Exceptional Scientific Achievement (1992) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Astronomy |
| Institutions | NSFNOIRLab Princeton University |
| Thesis | High resolution surface photometry of elliptical galaxies (1983) |
| Doctoral advisor | Sandra M. Faber |
Tod Richard Lauer (born 1957)[citation needed] is an American astronomer on the research staff of the NSFNOIRLab.
Lauer studied Astronomy at theCalifornia Institute of Technology and graduated with a BS degree in 1979. He received his PhD degree in Astronomy from theUniversity of California, Santa Cruz in 1983 forHigh resolution surface photometry of elliptical galaxies.[1]
Lauer was a member of theHubble Space TelescopeWide Field and Planetary Camera team, and is a founding member of theNuker Team. His research interests includes observational searches for massiveblack holes[2] in the centers ofgalaxies, the structure ofelliptical galaxies,stellar populations,large-scale structure of the universe, and astronomicalimage processing.[3] He was the Principal Investigator of theDestinyJDEM concept study,[4] one of the precursors to theNancy Grace Roman Space Telescope mission. Asteroid3135 Lauer is named for him. He appears in an episode of the documentary seriesNaked Science.[5] He joined theNew Horizons Pluto team in order to apply his extensive experience with deep space imaging to theNew Horizons data, yielding significantly clearer and mathematically accurate images ofPluto andCharon.
An asteroid, (3135) Lauer, was named in his honor in 1981.[6] In 1992, Lauer was awarded theNASA Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal for his work with the Wide-Field and Planetary Camera aboard the Hubble Space Telescope.[7] Lauer has been twice awarded the AURA Outstanding Achievement Award for Outstanding Science for 1993[8] and 2016[9] by theAssociation of Universities for Research in Astronomy. As a member of the New Horizons team, Lauer shared the 2017NASA Group Achievement Award.[10] As a member of theEvent Horizon Telescope collaboration, Lauer shared the 2020Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics.
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