Debra Elmegreen

Elmegreen was born in South Bend, Indiana in 1952. She became interested in astronomy at a young age. She received her bachelor's degree in astrophysics from the Princeton University in 1975, where she was the first woman to graduate with an astrophysics major. She earned both her Masters and Ph.D. from Harvard University in astronomy. In 1976 she married Bruce Elmegreen, an astronomer. ==Career==

Elmegreen did post-doctoral research at the Hale Observatory (now Mount Wilson Observatory) beginning in 1979, where she was the first female post-doctoral researcher at any of the Carnegie Observatories. Elmegreen is particularly interested in star formation and star forming galaxies. and was appointed as a board member of the 2010 Astronomy and Astrophysics Decadal Survey through the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. In 2013, she and her husband authored a paper, "The Onset of Spiral Structure in the Universe", published in the Astrophysical Journal. She was the President of the International Astronomical Union, (2021–2024, President-Elect 2018–21; VP 2015–18). ==Recognition==

She was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2019. In 2018, Elmegreen won the George Van Biesbroeck Prize for her unselfish service to astronomy on regional, national, and international scales. She was elected a Legacy Fellow of the American Astronomical Society in 2020 She was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2011 ==Works==

• Galaxies and Galactic Structure, Prentice Hall, 1997, Elmegreen has also published over 200 academic papers including: • Elmegreen, D. M., S4 G team, 2011, “Grand Design and Flocculent Spirals in the Spitzer Survey of Stellar Structure in Galaxies,” Astrophysical Journal, 737, 32 • Elmegreen, D.M., et al. 2009, “Clumpy Galaxies in GEMS and GOODS: Massive Analogs of Local Dwarf Irregulars,” Astrophysical Journal, 701, 306 • Elmegreen, D., et al. 2007, “Resolved Galaxies in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field: Star Formation in Disks at High Redshift,” Astrophysical Journal, 658, 763 ==References==