U.S. Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker today issued a statement congratulating Ana Maria Rey for being named a winner of the 2013 John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation of Chicago Fellowship. Rey is a physicist and fellow at JILA, a joint institute of the University of Colorado Boulder and Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).

“I am proud to congratulate Ana Maria Rey for her recent MacArthur Fellowship win. This ‘genius grant’ honor not only recognizes the importance of NIST and JILA’s research programs, but also our public-private partnership with UC-Boulder, which fosters cutting-edge, world class research and innovation that will help keep America competitive in the 21st century.”

To learn more about Ana Maria Rey and JILA, visit http://jila-amo.colorado.edu/science/profiles/ana-maria-rey.