NASA Postdoctoral Program - Space Science: Planetary System Dynamics

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 planetary system dynamics, studying how the Sun, planets, and smaller bodies within our solar system influence each other's motion through Newtonian gravitation. The research program examines dynamical processes in planetary systems, especially chaos and the long-term stability of orbital configurations, integrating systems based on our planetary system, the satellite systems of giant planets, extrasolar planetary systems, and hypothetical configurations modeling late stages of planetary growth. The goal is to understand our own solar system and to predict the types of planetary and satellite systems which may stably orbit other stars. The position is located at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California, under the advisorship of Jack Lissauer.