Chemistry in Star-Forming Regions

The NASA Postdoctoral Program (NPP) offers unique research opportunities to highly-talented scientists to engage in ongoing NASA research projects at a NASA Center, NASA Headquarters, or at a NASA-affiliated research institute. These one- to three-year fellowships are competitive and are designed to advance NASA's missions in space science, Earth science, aeronautics, space operations, exploration systems, and astrobiology. This specific opportunity focuses on theoretical astrochemistry at JPL using sophisticated chemical networks to model the chemistry of gas and ices in protostellar disks and molecular cloud cores. The emphasis is on the observational signatures of the different stages of evolution, and on the development of complex organic or pre-biotic chemistry. Molecules are important tracers, not only of chemical composition but also physical conditions, and they play a crucial role in the star formation process and in the evolution of protostellar disks.