Wanda Diaz-Merced
Personal Information
Born: Unknown
Country of Birth: Puerto Rico
Nationality: USA
Ethnicity: Hispanic
Education
University of Puerto Rico BS Physics; University of Glasgow PhD Computer Science 2015
""My advice to young people would be to remember that outstanding people do not become great overnight. They have to keep focus until they become victors in their mission. Not giving up is really hard, but just keep moving forward, find good mentors and be a good mentee." (royalsociety.org)"
— Wanda Diaz-Merced
Professional Life
Field of Study: Astronomy
Institution/Corporation: European Gravitational Observatory
Degrees & Memberships: Member: International Astronomical Union
Awards & Achievements
Awards: Named 1 of 7 Most Trailblazing Women in Science, BBC; 2011, Googles 1st Annual European Scholarship for Students with Disabilities; 2017, Estrella Luike Trophy
Achievements: Driven to create sonification software (xSonify) so she could fully participate in astrophysical endeavors despite her blindness; a leader in increasing equality of access to astronomy & using audible sound to study astrophysical data; has led the International Astronomical Union (IAU) Office of Astronomy for Development (OAD) project AstroSense since 2014; worked on a music album "X-Ray Hydra" which includes 9 pieces of music derived from NASA's Chandra X-Ray Observatory rendered as sound; her research has shown visual data hides some information that audible data doesn't & focuses on new ways to study radiation from stars & objects in space without using vision; developed Stellar seismology; works in Gamma Ray busts (GRB); with Allyson Bieryla & Soley Hyman developed LightSound to enable blind people hear astronomical events like eclipses
Was awarded the 1st Google scholarship for people with disabilities
Lost her sight in her early 20s; now uses audio to study space science telemetry through sonification
Has collaborated with Gerhard Sonnert on a music album based on her audio representations, "X-Ray Hydra" includes 9 pieces of music derived from NASA's Chandra X-Ray Observatory rendered as sound
A classmate who was an amateur astronomer was participating in a NASA program called Radio Jove, recording & analyzing radio transmissions from Jupiter, the Sun, & galaxy using a small make-it-yourself antenna; he had her listen to a radio signal from a solar flare & she was hooked, joining the program