Beginning with PiE 2023, each PiE meeting will feature a $2,000 award in the name of Sequoia’s co-founder, Dr. Yogi Agrawal: The Eva and Yogi Agrawal Award for Significant Contributions to our Science Through Novel Observations. The only stipulation being that the awardee is to be selected amongst the scientists who presented results at the PREVIOUS PiE conference mainly based on novel observations.
At the 2023 Particles in Europe (PiE) conference dinner it was revealed that Dr. Spyros Chaikalis, HCMR, Greece was the winner of the inaugural Eva & Yogi Agrawal Award for his 2018 PiE presentation ‘LISST measurements in the Mediterranean Sea: Relationships between particle optical characteristics and hydrology.’
The award committee cites the following reason: Dr. Chaikalis presents a novel set of extensive observations that are otherwise very difficult and costly to reproduce, and of relatively wide impact within the field of particle dynamics in large basins. The dataset confirms the existence of an oligotrophy gradient increasing from west to east in the Mediterranean Sea, highlighted as a decrease in particle abundance. An increase of particle mean size with depth in the eastern basin is recorded for the first time and opens new questions on the processes that control transport and fate of particles in the ocean. The dataset is well explained and presented and in addition to the data presented, the study shows wide applicability (and limitations) of LISST-based measurements to large-scale understanding of particle dynamics in the ocean. The methods and processing considerations that the study presents are very important for many members of the particle-measurement community.
Watch the entire award ceremony below:
Congratulations Dr. Chaikalis!