Victoria Researcher Scoop Science Awards

Victoria researchers scoop science awards

Victoria University researchers Dr Noam Greenberg and Dr Simon Lamb have scooped New Zealand Association of Scientists (NZAS) awards for their contribution to science.

Dr Greenberg, an Associate Professor in Victoria’s School of Mathematics, Statistics and Operations Research, is the recipient of the 2013 Research Medal, awarded for outstanding research published by a scientist under the age of 40.

Dr Greenberg works on the mathematics of computability, carrying out research which sheds light on the fundamental capabilities and limitations of the algorithms used by modern computers and software.

The international quality of his research has been recognised by the award of a Rutherford Discovery Fellowship from the Royal Society of New Zealand in 2011, and a Turing Research Fellowship from the United States-based John Templeton Foundation in 2012.

Dr Simon Lamb, an Associate Professor in the School of Geography, Environment and Earth Sciences is the recipient of the 2013 Science Communicators Award for excellence in communicating science to the general public.

Dr Lamb has a sustained record of high impact communication of the science of climate change. He is the maker of Thin Ice, a documentary on climate change released in April last year that has since been viewed more than 50,000 times. He has also written several books and made television programmes and films which have reached large global audiences. His book, The Devil and the Mountain, which describes his own research into the formation of the Andes, was named on the New York Times Book Review’s list of 100 Notable Books for 2004.

The Awards will be presented at the 2014 Annual Conference of the NZAS, which takes place in Auckland on Saturday 5 April.