ANN ARBOR—Three University of Michigan professors are among the 126 early career scientists and scholars from the United States and Canada selected as 2016 Alfred P. Sloan research fellows.

The foundation honors researchers it deems “rising stars, the next generation of scientific leaders.” The fellows, who were nominated by their peers and chosen by a panel of senior scholars, each receives $55,000 to further their research.

Those selected from U-M are:

• Paul Zimmerman, assistant professor of chemistry, College of Literature, Science, and the Arts
• Michael Cafarella, a Morris Wellman Faculty Development Assistant Professor of Computer Science and Engineering and assistant professor of electrical engineering and computer science, College of Engineering
• Honglak Lee, a Morris Wellman Faculty Development Assistant Professor of Computer Science and Engineering, and assistant professor of electrical engineering and computer science, College of Engineering

“Getting early-career support can be a make-or-break moment for a young scholar,” said Paul Joskow, president of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. “In an increasingly competitive academic environment, it can be difficult to stand out, even when your work is first rate. The Sloan Research Fellowships have become an unmistakable marker of quality among researchers. Fellows represent the best-of-the-best among young scientists.”

Past Sloan Research Fellows have gone on to notable careers and include such intellectual giants as physicists Richard Feynman and Murray Gell-Mann, and game theorist John Nash. Since the beginning of the program in 1955, 43 fellows have received a Nobel Prize in their respective field and 68 have received the National Medal of Science.

The foundation is a philanthropic, not-for-profit, grant-making institution based in New York, established in 1934 by Alfred Pritchard Sloan Jr., then-president and chief executive officer of General Motors.