Two women faculty members from the University of Colorado at Boulder will be inducted into the National Academy of Sciences on Saturday, April 22, in a ceremony in Washington, D.C.
University of Colorado Museum Director and anthropology Professor Linda Cordell and Deborah Jin, a fellow at the National Institute of Standards and Technology and an associate adjoint professor in CU-Boulder's physics department, will be honored at the ceremony in the NAS Great Hall. The public induction ceremony will be followed by a reception.
Cordell and Jin were among 72 members and 18 foreign associates elected to the NAS for their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research in 2005.
The CU-Boulder professors were the only Colorado scientists elected to NAS in 2005. A total of 21 CU-Boulder faculty have been elected to the prestigious academy to date.
Election to NAS, which has 1,976 active members, is considered one of the highest honors for an American scientist or engineer. NAS is dedicated to furthering science for the general welfare and was established in 1863 by Congress during President Abraham Lincoln's tenure.
Cordell received her doctorate in anthropology from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1972. She joined the faculty at the University of New Mexico in 1971 and became director of the CU Museum and a CU-Boulder professor of anthropology in 1994.
Cordell's research has focused primarily on the archaeology of Pueblo peoples of the American Southwest. She has studied agricultural and settlement strategies of ancestral Pueblos of New Mexico, including how large villages supported themselves during unpredictable precipitation cycles. She has authored a number of books and scientific papers during her career.
Cordell plans to retire from the university this spring, after which she will be an emeritus professor in the CU-Boulder anthropology department.
Jin received her doctorate in physics from the University of Chicago in 1995. She came to Boulder in 1997 as a NIST physicist and an assistant adjoint professor at CU-Boulder.
In 2003, Jin and CU-Boulder researchers Markus Greiner and Cindy Regal coaxed atoms into the first "fermionic condensate," a new form of matter that may help physicists unlock mysteries of high-temperature superconductivity.
Also is 2003 Jin was awarded a $500,000 MacArthur Fellowship, popularly known as a "genius grant," for her research achievements.