2023-09-21 22:14:36
In another chapter of Your New DNA, Andrea Obaid spoke with Astronomer Laura Pérez, Chilean scientist who was recognized in the 2024 New Horizons Prize in Physics category for his work in the area of planetary formation.
This is a prize awarded by the Breakthrough Prize Foundation and for the first time goes to a compatriot highlighting their research worldwide. The first thing the guest valued is “the nice thing is that we share it with four young scientists.” Likewise, she clarified that “this is the announcement of the award and there will be a ceremony in 2024.”
“We are all under 40 years old, so it allows us to advance even further in our careers,” he added, highlighting the importance it takes with a view to the future. This, contemplating the development of Chile in this matter “Thanks to the access policy, to the observatories we have in our country, which is very important.”
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planet formation
Regarding the topic that led Pérez to win the award, it has to do with his study over the years to learn how planets are formed and different aspects that emerge from this.
“This award is for our four contributions to planetary formation research, which we study it when we look at young stars in the galaxy (…) if you look at stars like the sun, when it was a ‘baby’, you might detect how the material is distributed, what the dynamics of these objects are like, how they move,” he explained.
Furthermore, the scientist pointed out that work like this “is what the ALMA telescope allows us to do,” although she pointed out that “one of the things that had been predicted, but had not really been observed, is that If planets form around one of these young stars, they will modify the material“.
“We call that material that orbits around the protoplanetary disk and It’s going to leave a mark, it’s going to leave grooves“he added.
In this way, with different studies focused on planetary formation, Laura Pérez indicated that “we were able to show that These regions exist, which trap dustand it is one of the reasons why they gave us the award.”
A milestone in the scientific context
The award turns out to be a great milestone, but it is not intended to be the top of research in this field and gives light to continue developing and acquiring knowledge towards the future.
Along these lines, the specialist commented that “what we are doing in my research group, together with different members, is look for those plans that should be forming. We already see those footprints, those grooves.”
He appealed that “an attempt should be made to find the planets directly; That’s why you don’t use the ALMA telescope, you use the emission of the planet itself and for that we use optical telescopes“.
“When those giant telescopes are installed in Chile there is going to be a revolution in this field once more. It is going to be wonderful and there is already a lot of progress,” she added.
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