Alan Michael Dressler is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 astronomer

Astronomer

An astronomer is a scientist who studies celestial bodies such as planets, stars and galaxies.Historically, astronomy was more concerned with the classification and description of phenomena in the sky, while astrophysics attempted to explain these phenomena and the differences between them using...

 at the Carnegie Institution for Science

Carnegie Institution for Science

The Carnegie Institution for Science is an organization in the United States established to support scientific research....

 of Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

. Among his works is the popularization Voyage To The Great Attractor: Exploring Intergalactic Space.

Dressler was born in Cincinnati, Ohio

Ohio

Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...

, graduated from Walnut Hills High School in 1966, and received his bachelor's degree

Bachelor's degree

A bachelor's degree is usually an academic degree awarded for an undergraduate course or major that generally lasts for three or four years, but can range anywhere from two to six years depending on the region of the world...

 in physics

Physics

Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...

 in 1970 from the University of California, Berkeley

University of California, Berkeley

The University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...

 and his doctorate

Doctorate

A doctorate is an academic degree or professional degree that in most countries refers to a class of degrees which qualify the holder to teach in a specific field, A doctorate is an academic degree or professional degree that in most countries refers to a class of degrees which qualify the holder...

 in astronomy in 1976 from the University of California, Santa Cruz

University of California, Santa Cruz

The University of California, Santa Cruz, also known as UC Santa Cruz or UCSC, is a public, collegiate university; one of ten campuses in the University of California...

. His primary professional interests lie in cosmology

Cosmology

Cosmology is the discipline that deals with the nature of the Universe as a whole. Cosmologists seek to understand the origin, evolution, structure, and ultimate fate of the Universe at large, as well as the natural laws that keep it in order...

, birth and evolution of galaxies

Galaxy

A galaxy is a massive, gravitationally bound system that consists of stars and stellar remnants, an interstellar medium of gas and dust, and an important but poorly understood component tentatively dubbed dark matter. The word galaxy is derived from the Greek galaxias , literally "milky", a...

, astronomical instrumentation, and extragalactic astronomy.

From 1993 to 1995 Dressler chaired the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA)

Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy

The Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy is a consortium of universities and other institutions that operates astronomical observatories and telescopes...

 committee "HST & Beyond: Exploration and the Search for Origins" that provided NASA with the document "A Vision for Ultraviolet-Optical-Infrared Space Astronomy". He was a member of the Nuker Team

Nuker Team

The Nuker Team was organized in 1985 to use the Hubble Space Telescope, with its high-resolution imaging and spectroscopy, to investigate the central structure and dynamics of galaxies. The team uses the space telescope to examine supermassive black holes and determined the relationship between a...

 and the Morphs collaboration

Morphs collaboration

The Morphs collaboration was a coordinated study to determine the morphologies of galaxies in distant clusters and to investigate the evolution of galaxies as a function of environment and epoch...

 which studied the evolution of spiral galaxies using the Magellan Telescopes

Magellan telescopes

The Magellan Telescopes are a pair of 6.5 m diameter optical telescopes located at Las Campanas Observatory in Chile. The two telescopes are named after the astronomer Walter Baade and the philanthropist Landon T...

 and the Hubble Space Telescope

Hubble Space Telescope

The Hubble Space Telescope is a space telescope that was carried into orbit by a Space Shuttle in 1990 and remains in operation. A 2.4 meter aperture telescope in low Earth orbit, Hubble's four main instruments observe in the near ultraviolet, visible, and near infrared...

. Dressler was chaiman of the Origins Subcommittee (OS) for NASA

NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...

 from 2000 to 2003, but declined membership in the Review of Near-Earth Object Surveys and Hazard Mitigation Strategies, Survey/Detection Panel

Spaceguard

The term Spaceguard loosely refers to a number of efforts to discover and study near-Earth objects . Asteroids are discovered by telescopes which repeatedly survey large areas of sky. Efforts which concentrate on discovering NEOs are considered part of the "Spaceguard Survey," regardless of which...

. Dressler is currently working on the Inamori Magellan Areal Camera and Spectrograph (IMACS) Cluster Building Survey which studies the evolution of steller structures and populations in distant galaxy clusters, which means the events observed took place four to seven billion years ago. He is also a member of the Terrestrial Planet Finder Coronograph Science and technology definition team.

Awards

In 1983 Dressler received the Newton Lacy Pierce Prize in Astronomy

Newton Lacy Pierce Prize in Astronomy

The Newton Lacy Pierce Prize in Astronomy is awarded annually by the American Astronomical Society to a young astronomer for outstanding achievement in observational astronomical research.Pierce Prize winners:* 1974 Edwin M. Kellogg...

 from the American Astronomical Society

American Astronomical Society

The American Astronomical Society is an American society of professional astronomers and other interested individuals, headquartered in Washington, DC...

 He was elected to the United States National Academy of Sciences

United States National Academy of Sciences

The National Academy of Sciences is a corporation in the United States whose members serve pro bono as "advisers to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine." As a national academy, new members of the organization are elected annually by current members, based on their distinguished and...

 in the field of astronomy

Astronomy

Astronomy is a natural science that deals with the study of celestial objects and phenomena that originate outside the atmosphere of Earth...

 in 1996. In 1999 he received the Public Service Medal

NASA Public Service Medal

NASA's Exceptional Public Service Medal is a United States government award granted for exceptional contributions to the mission of NASA to anyone who was not a government employee when the service was performed.- See also :...

 from NASA.

External links

• "Alan Dressler" Carnegie Institution for Science