Biography:Karen Jean Meech
| see § List of discovered minor planets |
Karen J. Meech (born 1959) is an American planetary astronomer at the Institute for Astronomy (IfA) of the University of Hawaiʻi.[2]
Career
Karen Meech specializes in planetary astronomy, in particular the study of distant comets and their relation to the early Solar System. She is also very active in professional-amateur collaboration and science teacher education and was the founder of the Towards Planetary Systems (TOPS) high-school teacher / student outreach program that helps educate science teachers in the Pacific islands. She received her PhD in Planetary Sciences in 1987 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a BS from Rice University in Houston in 1981, and has received several awards in her career, including the Annie J. Cannon Award in Astronomy in 1988 and the American Astronomical Society's H. C. Urey Prize in 1994.
She was a co-investigator on the Deep Impact mission and current co-investigator on the NASA Discovery missions EPOXI and Stardust-NExT. For all three of these missions she has coordinated the world's Earth-based and space-based observing programs. She is the primary investigator of the University of Hawaiʻi NASA Astrobiology Institute lead team which focuses its research on "Water and Habitable Worlds". She is currently the President of the International Astronomical Union Division III (Planetary Systems Science).
Honors
The outer main-belt asteroid 4367 Meech, discovered by Schelte Bus at the Siding Spring Observatory in 1981, is named in her honor.[3]
List of discovered minor planets
| (228229) 1998 MO17 | 27 June 1998 | list |
| (356386) 2010 OK49 | 24 June 2004 | list |
| (469361) 2001 HY65 | 26 April 2001 | list [A] |
| (551000) 2012 UQ169 | 29 May 2003 | list [A] |
| (553412) 2011 OR46 | 29 May 2003 | list [A] |
| (557417) 2014 UQ178 | 30 May 2003 | list [A] |
| (562541) 2016 AL56 | 30 May 2003 | list [A] |
| (565078) 2017 BR47 | 31 May 2003 | list [A] |
| (566268) 2017 RH61 | 30 May 2003 | list [A] |
| Co-discovery made with: A M. W. Buie | ||
|---|---|---|
References
- ↑ "Minor Planet Discoverers (by number)". Minor Planet Center. 15 June 2021. http://www.minorplanetcenter.net/iau/lists/MPDiscsNum.html. Retrieved 19 July 2021.
- ↑ "Faculty list". Institute for Astronomy. http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/faculty/. Retrieved 10 January 2011.
- ↑ Schmadel, Lutz D. (2007). "(4367) Meech". Dictionary of Minor Planet Names. Springer Berlin Heidelberg. p. 375. doi:10.1007/978-3-540-29925-7_4318. ISBN 978-3-540-00238-3.
External links
- Karen Jean Meech homepage at Institute for Astronomy
- Talk of Karen Jean Meech at the Origins 2011 congress
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