UNA student Daniel Johnson, 34, has never been satisfied with people giving him answers without him finding the solution himself first. The physics and math double major admits that he never grew out of the phase in which he asked “why” to everything.

“I’m one of these nerds who sits and watches the science channel constantly,” he said. “My son is the one that looks up to sports stars Emmitt Smith and Randy Moss, while I’m the one who looks up to Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking.”

Johnson, who said his love of learning and astronomy have governed his life for many years, will soon come one step closer to achieving his dreams after being awarded a national grant to conduct research in Cerro Tololo, Chile this summer.

Johnson submitted a research proposal in October 2010 to Sigma Xi Scientific Research Society on the topic of star clusters. The society, which makes up 60,000 scientists from more than 100 countries, awarded Johnson a $2,800 grant to study in Chile for 10 days in late July with UNA planetarium director Dr. Mel Blake.

“I am excited and thankful to Dr. Blake for his help and encouragement,” he said. “Any research experience that you have when you’re applying to graduate school helps and the fact that I’ve gotten this national grant will hopefully make me competitive for future jobs.”

During the 10-day excursion in July, Johnson and Blake intend to use the grant to study two star clusters to see which one has more variable stars and to see if there is any correlation between the populations of large blue and variable stars.

“The key thing to me is that this is a grant that was written by Daniel and it’s a national competition with grants that students from all over the United States are competing for,” Blake said. “This certainly says something about him in that he went after it. There were students from big schools that were applying for this money and for him to beat out the competition like that is pretty good.”

Johnson, a 2009 graduate of Jackson State Community College with an associate’s degree in general studies with an emphasis in biology, is the vice president of the UNA Society of Physics Students and was recently able to secure funding to help build UNA’s first radio telescope, which will begin construction this semester.

In addition to attending school full time, Johnson works 40-hours a week as a phlebotomist and lab assistant with Hardin Medical Center in Savannah, Tenn. He hopes to attain a Ph.D. in physics after graduation and eventually work for NASA.

Johnson, who dreams of attending Harvard, MIT, Princeton and Yale to earn his doctorate degree, hopes this national grant is one of many more accomplishments to come.

“My main worry now is that I want to show a trend where I’m always pulling off bigger and better things,” he said.