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NORTH AMERICAN Newsline MARCH 15, 2024 | The Indian Eye 30

NEWSMAKERS OF THE WEEK

Selected stories about Indian diaspora from our website www.theindianeye.com

NIKKI HALEY PRIYAMVADA NATARAJAN

Republican becomes the first Scientist named American

woman to win a primary Astronomical Society fellow

ikki Haley, the Indian American and a former US ambassador to ndian American theoretical astrophysicist Priyamvada Natarajan has been
the UN, won Washington DC primary. However, Trump has won the elected a fellow of the American Astronomical Society (AAS). She is rec-
Nfirst eight nominating contests by significant margins before losing Iognized for her seminal research on the nature of dark matter and black
to Haley in America’s capital city. Haley clinched 62.9% of the vote, to Mr hole physics.
Trump’s 33.2%. Haley will pick up 19 delegates from this win, a small portion “I am delighted and honored to be recognized by my peers, which is super
of the 1,215 delegates needed to clinch the nomination. special,” Natarajan said. “I am so grateful and thrilled for the reactions I’ve
Washington DC is 100% urban and a relatively high proportion of res- had to my research work, and accolades such as this are a wonderful icing on
idents hold a college degree. The city is home to a significant number of the cake.”
federal workers who Trump allies have pledged to fire en masse and replace Natarajan is among 21 fellows chosen this year for extraordinary achieve-
with loyalists if he wins in November. Some categories of federal workers ment and service. She was named “for seminal contributions to our under-
have seen an increase in death threats in recent years, and Trump often re- standing of the nature of dark matter and black hole physics, and for the
fers to the DC area as the “swamp.” development of a brand-new framework that enables mapping the detailed
Ms Haley’s campaign national spokesperson Olivia Perez-Cubas said: distribution of dark matter on small scales within galaxy clusters using gravi-
“it’s not surprising that Republicans closest to Washington dysfunction are tational lensing.”
rejecting Donald Trump and all his chaos”. She was born in Coimbatore and studied at the Massachusetts Institute
Trump attacked and mocked Haley after Sunday’s result on his Truth So- of Technology, Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge. Natarajan is
cial platform, posting: “I purposely stayed away from the D.C. Vote because a professor in the departments of astronomy and physics at Yale University.
it is the ‘Swamp,’ with very few delegates, and no upside. Birdbrain spent She is noted for her work in mapping dark matter and dark energy, partic-
all of her time, money and effort there. Over the weekend we won Missouri, ularly with her work in gravitational lensing, and in models describing the
Idaho, and Michigan - BIG NUMBERS - Complete destruction of a very assembly and accretion histories of supermassive black holes.
weak opponent. The really big numbers will come on Super Tuesday.” She is an elected fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,
According to BBC, it is seen as a largely symbolic win, as the capital is a the American Physical Society, and the American Association for the Ad-
heavily Democrat-leaning jurisdiction, with only about 23,000 registered Re- vancement of Science. She also is the recipient of Guggenheim and Radcliffe
publicans in the city. Local party officials said 2,035 Republicans participated fellowships.
in the primary, as reported by the Washington Post. Continued on next page... >>

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