Peter Nugent and Elizabeth Bautista Honored for Exceptional Achievement

August 12, 2013

Peter Nugent (left) accepting award from Eddy Rubin.

(right).

Peter Nugent and Elizabeth Bautista of the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) have been recognized with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) Director’s Awards of Exceptional Achievement. The awards were presented Aug. 8 in a ceremony in the Bldg. 50 auditorium.

Nugent, co-leader of the Computational Cosmology Center and NERSC Analytics Group Lead, was honored for scientific achievement in helping create the Palomar Transient Factory, a scientific pipeline of images from the universe, streamed from the Palomar Observatory in Southern California and then archived at NERSC and made available to scientists around the world as they seek to increase our understanding of supernovae. In presenting the award, Associate Laboratory Director for General Sciences James Symons called Nugent’s work “groundbreaking” and setting a new standard for supporting scientific research.

Elizabeth Bautista (left) accepting award from Kathy Yelick.

Bautista, NERSC's Operations Technology Group Lead, was recognized for her work in diversity, particularly her efforts to encourage students to pursue careers in computer science and to give the students hands-on experience through expanded internship opportunities. As she presented the award, Associate Laboratory Director for Computing Sciences Kathy Yelick said that Bautista has “made the lab a better and friendlier place to work.”

About NERSC and Berkeley Lab
The National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) is a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science User Facility that serves as the primary high performance computing center for scientific research sponsored by the Office of Science. Located at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, NERSC serves almost 10,000 scientists at national laboratories and universities researching a wide range of problems in climate, fusion energy, materials science, physics, chemistry, computational biology, and other disciplines. Berkeley Lab is a DOE national laboratory located in Berkeley, California. It conducts unclassified scientific research and is managed by the University of California for the U.S. Department of Energy. »Learn more about computing sciences at Berkeley Lab.