Farinella Prize 2017 – Citation

The 7th Farinella Prize for the year 2017 on the topic “Physics and dynamics of the inner planets of the solar system and their satellites” was awarded to Dr Simone Marchi (Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado) with the following motivation:

Simone Marchi has made significant contributions to understanding the complex problems related to the impact history and physical evolution of the inner Solar System, including the Moon. He has investigated the origin and consequences of Late Heavy Bombardment, including the surface properties and evolution of Ceres and Vesta. His research has always been interdisciplinary and he has successfully exploited knowledge coming from meteorite geology and geochemistry. His outstanding publication record shows that he has mastered the different techniques of image processing and analysis, spectroscopy and numerical simulations. Considering his young age and his record of scientific publications and involvement in space missions, Simone Marchi has demonstrated the wide impact of his research on the many domains of the modern planetology, and is well deserving of the 2017 Farinella Prize.

Committee:

David Smith (Chair), MIT, USA
Federico Costanzo, INAF-IAPS, Italy
Mario Di Martino, INAF-OATO, Italy
William Folkner, JPL, USA
Tilman Spohn, DLR, Germany
Paolo Tanga, Observatoire de la Cote d’Azur, France