2021 MERAC Prize to Judit Szulágyi

Judit Szul¨¢gyi receives the external page award ¡°for her fundamental contribution to the study of circumplanetary disks in planet formation, and the origin of the moons of giant planets¡± in the category New Technologies (Computational). She will give a plenary lecture at the external page European Astronomical Society Annual Meeting 2021 from 28 June to 2 July 2021 (held virtually).

In 2020, Judit Szul¨¢gyi was appointed as Assistant Professor of Computational Astrophysics in the Institute for Particle Physics and Astrophysics (IPA) where she leads the Computational Astrophysics Group. Her research focuses on the formation and evolution of planetary systems and moons, mainly by developing and using computer simulations. Professor Szul¨¢gyi¡¯s algorithms and models are particularly noted for taking full account of the propagation of radiation in these forming planetary systems, as well as demonstrating unprecedented spatial resolution in the computer simulations.

Judit Szul¨¢gyi was awarded a external page European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant in 2020 to further the understanding the formation of planets and their moons. She has won several science prizes during her career, for example, she was one of the young scientists included on the Forbes ¡°external page 30 Under 30 in Science¡± list in 2017.