MIT’s Sara Seager Honored With One of Canada’s Highest Civilian Honors

Sara Seager, Class of 1941 Professor of Planetary Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has been named an officer of the Order of Canada, one of the country’s highest civilian honors. Dr. Seager was honored “for her multidisciplinary research that has contributed to transforming the study of extrasolar planets into a full-fledged planetary science.”

Dr. Seager, who was raised in Ontario, holds dual Canadian and United States citizenship. AT MIT, she holds academic appointments in the departments of earth, atmospheric and planetary sciences, physics, and aeronautics and astronautics. Her research is focused on finding Earth-like planets in other solar systems.

Professor Seager’s work has earned her extensive acclaim, including a MacArthur Fellowship, the Raymond and Beverly Sackler Prize in the Physical Sciences, and election to the American Philosophical Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the National Academy of Sciences.

Professor Seager received a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and physics from the University of Toronto in 1994. She earned a Ph.D. in astronomy from Harvard University in 1999.