Laboratory and Computational Investigations of Isotope Effects on Planetary Bodies

The NASA Postdoctoral Program offers unique research opportunities to highly-talented scientists to engage in ongoing NASA research projects. This specific fellowship opportunity focuses on investigating isotopic compositions of minerals, organics, liquids, and gaseous species from planetary bodies throughout the Solar System. The research combines laboratory experiments, analytical measurements, mathematical modeling, and computational chemistry to investigate physical and chemical processes and their isotopic signatures on simple organic and inorganic molecules in terrestrial and extraterrestrial rocks and minerals. Postdoctoral fellows would contribute by performing laboratory experiments to determine isotopic fractionations in planetary environments such as Titan's lakes and Mars' atmosphere, and/or performing high-fidelity quantum-mechanical and molecular dynamics simulations. These highly cross-disciplinary projects are at the cutting edge of isotope geochemistry and support several active NASA missions including MSL Curiosity, OSIRIS-REx, Mars Sample Return, and future missions. The fellowship duration is one to three years and is administered through the NASA Postdoctoral Program at JPL.