Doris Maier, Senior Research Scientist in IRAM’s Frontend Laboratory, has been awarded the 2026 CNRS Crystal Medal, in recognition of her work on cryogenic detectors for millimeter-wave radio astronomy.

Her work focuses in particular on the development of superconducting SIS mixers, key components of the receiver systems used at major radio astronomy facilities, including NOEMA and ALMA. Together with the IRAM teams, she has contributed to successive generations of these devices, improving their performance and opening the way to new instrumental developments.

Technologies developed by Doris and the IRAM teams have also been used in instruments that contributed to the first images of black holes obtained by the international Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration.

IRAM warmly congratulates Doris on this distinction.

Read the portrait of Doris Maier on the CNRS Alpes website