Associated Universities, Inc. and the National Radio Astronomy Observatory are pleased to announce and congratulate the prize recipients of the 2008 AUI/NRAO Image Contest.
The power of multiwavelength imaging is the common theme of winners in the 2008 AUI/NRAO Image Contest. The three top prize winners and three honorable-mention winners combined, all told, data from NRAO and other radio observatories with submillimeter, optical, infrared, and X-ray data from ground-based and orbiting observatories. Twenty images were submitted by 11 scientists.
The results were both scientifically intriguing and beautiful.
The $1,000 first prize went to Adam Ginsburg of the University of Colorado-Boulder, for a radio-submillimeter-infrared composite of the Milky Way's complex and fascinating central region. The image shows the relationships among hot, massive star formation, supernova remnants, cold molecular gas, and magnetic fields in the region near our Galaxy's central black hole.
The second prize winner, Francesco Massaro of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, used radio, optical, and X-ray data to produce a compelling image of the radio galaxy 3C 305 in the constellation Draco.
The third prize image combined radio and X-ray data of the remnant of the Supernova of 386 AD. Mallory Roberts of Eureka Scientific, Inc. continued the work begun by the ancient Chinese astronomers who observed the supernova explosion. The X-ray data reveals a wind created by a pulsar at the center of the remnant.
Three images received honorable mentions. Farhad Yusef-Zadeh of Northwestern University won for an image of stars and gas orbiting the massive black hole at the Milky Way's center. Michael Bietenholz of York University and Hartebeesthoek Radio Observatory won for a radio-X-ray image of the pulsar-powered supernova remnant G21.5-0.9, and Volker Heesen of Astronomisches Institut der Ruhr-Universität Bochum (AIRUB) won for an image revealing the magnetic-field structure in the nearby starburst galaxy NGC 253.
"Our congratulations go to all the winners, along with our appreciation for their efforts at making beautiful images that provide unique scientific insights," said NRAO Director Fred K.Y. Lo. "We also want to thank the Prize Panel who volunteered their time: Zolt Levay of the Space Telescope Science Institute; and Aeree Chung, Ron Maddalena, and John Stoke of the NRAO."