M. Darby Dyer, the Kennedy Schelkunoff Professor of Astronomy at Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Massachusetts, received the Eugene Shoemaker Distinguished Scientist Medal from the Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute.
The award was presented to Professor Dyer for her “significant scientific contributions throughout the course of her career.” Dr. Dyar’s research is focused on understanding how hydrogen and oxygen are distributed throughout our solar system.
Earlier this year, Dyar was also one of six scientists given the Helmholtz International Fellow Award, an honor given by Germany’s largest science organization to international scientists whose work contributes to “solving great, pressing questions facing society, science, and business.”
Dr. Dyer joined the faculty at Mount Holyoke College in 1998. Earlier in her career she taught at West Chester University of Pennsylvania and the University of Oregon. Professor Dyer is a graduate of Wellesley College in Massachusetts, where she double majored in geology and art history. She earned a Ph.D. in geochemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.