Introducing the Margaret Burbidge Visiting Professorship at UC San Diego Share By Heising-Simons Foundation on 5/3/2019 on 5/3/2019 With support from the Heising-Simons Foundation, the Division of Physical Sciences at UC San Diego has established the Margaret Burbidge Visiting Professorship, part of an effort to bring eminent female physicists to the university for collaborative research within its Department of Physics. Three visiting professors from Columbia University, ESPCI Paris, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign will fill the inaugural role beginning in the fall.
Grants Approved in the First Quarter of 2019 Share By Heising-Simons Foundation on 4/29/2019 on 4/29/2019 At the Heising-Simons Foundation, we are proud of the grants and partnerships we develop to advance the issues we care about, and we believe in being transparent about our grantmaking with our partners and the public. As part of the content that is shared on this website, you can already search all of our grants …
51 Pegasi b Fellow Helps Break New Ground in Exoplanet Imaging Share By Heising-Simons Foundation on 4/24/2019 on 4/24/2019 The GRAVITY instrument on the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI) has made the first direct observation of an exoplanet using optical interferometry. The result was presented last month in the paper, “First Direct Detection of an Exoplanet by Optical Interferometry,” published in the scientific journalAstronomy and Astrophysics.One ofthe study’s co-authors is 51 Pegasi …
2018 State of Preschool Yearbook Released Share By Heising-Simons Foundation on 4/19/2019 on 4/19/2019 Every year, the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) publishes a national report on state-funded preschool programs, tracking enrollment, spending, and policies that support quality learning. The 2018 State of Preschool Yearbook, released earlier this week and supported by the Foundation’s Education program, is the only report of its kind that helps educators, advocates, researchers, and policymakers understand how funding levels affect preschool access and program quality.
2019 Class of 51 Pegasi b Fellows Announced Share By Heising-Simons Foundation on 3/27/2019 on 3/27/2019 The Heising-Simons Foundation is pleased to announce the 2019 recipients of the 51 Pegasi b Fellowship in planetary astronomy. Recipients are recognized for their outstanding research achievements, their creativity, and their great promise in tackling risky and novel ideas. Since its inception in 2016, the 51 Pegasi b Fellowship has supported early-career scientists at a …
Intentionally Improving Processes for the 51 Pegasi b Fellowship Share By Heising-Simons Foundation on 3/27/2019 on 3/27/2019 Today the Heising-Simons Foundation is thrilled to announce the latest cohort of 51 Pegasi b Fellows. These six fellows represent some of the best and brightest minds launching careers in planetary astronomy, and we are humbled to play a small part in helping develop their talents. At the same time, the Foundation’s Science program would …
A New Hunt for Undiscovered Dark Matter Particles at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider Share By Heising-Simons Foundation on 3/6/2019 on 3/6/2019 The research board at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research), which operates the LHC, has approved the Forward Search Experiment, or FASER. Initiated by physicists at the University of California, Irvine, the multiyear FASER project is funded by grants of $1 million each from the Heising-Simons Foundation and the Simons Foundation, with additional support from CERN. The experiment will operate along the beam trajectory of the LHC, which creates new particles by smashing protons together at nearly the speed of light.
American Mosaic Journalism Prize Awarded to Rachel Kaadzi Ghansah and Abe Streep Share By Heising-Simons Foundation on 2/4/2019 on 2/4/2019 One year ago, we announced the creation of the American Mosaic Journalism Prize. This unrestricted cash prize of $100,000 per recipient is awarded to freelance journalists for excellence in long-form, narrative, or deep reporting about underrepresented and/or misrepresented groups in the American landscape. We created the prize as part of our work that supports journalism as an essential arm of U.S. democracy—recognizing that we live in a time when journalism seems both vulnerable and deeply needed, with the ability to expose audiences to new perspectives and bring about understanding. Today, we are pleased to announce the newest recipients of this prize: Rachel Kaadzi Ghansah and Abe Streep.
Climate Change Stories From Hispanic Communities Share By Heising-Simons Foundation on 11/8/2018 on 11/8/2018 In 2017, a national study conducted by grantee the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication (YPCCC) revealed that self-identified Hispanics in the United States are highly engaged with the issue of climate change. Pursuant to this finding, the Foundation’s Climate and Clean Energy program has supported the production of 25 radio episodes of YPCCC’s Climate Connections specifically focused on the Hispanic community, a demographic often overlooked in conversations about climate change.