Dr. Antje Peters (Photos by: on the left - Udo Kurilla, GSI; on the right- Antje Peters, private) has received the Panda Theory PhD Prize 2018 for her doctoral thesis at the Goethe University in Frankfurt. The award was presented at the most recent Panda Collaboration Meeting in Stockholm by the spokesperson Klaus Peters (GSI/U Frankfurt) and Stefan Leupold (U Uppsala) as the representative of the Panda Theory Advisory Group.
Physicist Antje Peters, 27, received the prize of €200 and a certificate for her dissertation titled "Investigation of heavy-light four-quark systems by means of Lattice QCD". Her doctoral advisor was JProf. Dr. Marc Wagner from the Goethe University in Frankfurt.
The Panda Collaboration has awarded the Theory PhD Prize for the first time in order to honor the best theory dissertation written in connection with the Panda Experiment and its science program in the last year. Panda will be one of the key experiments of the future accelerator center FAIR. 
The experiment focuses on antimatter research as well as on various topics related to the weak and the strong force, exotic states of matter, and the structure of hadrons. More than 500 scientists from 20 countries currently work in the Panda Collaboration.
Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the Panda Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the Panda Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the Panda Collaboration. The Panda Collaboration awards the Theory PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the Panda project and to highlight the importance of cooperation with theory groups.