NASA Postdoctoral Program: Space Science - Protoplanetary Disk Chemistry

The NASA Postdoctoral Program 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 research opportunity focuses on protoplanetary disk thermo-chemical and dynamical models being developed at NASA's Ames Research Center to understand the evolution of disks to form planets, predict line emission and interpret disk observations. One of the main goals is to determine the role of aromatic chemistry and photolysis in disk evolution, in the chemical inventory available for planet formation, and in influencing disk lifetimes and planet formation timescales. The principal task is to develop chemo-dynamical models by expanding on existing work to incorporate results from new, targeted laboratory experiments and quantum chemical theory, and to construct a new chemical network to study organics in disks. Interpreting observational data from ground and space-based facilities using the developed models will also be a key aspect of the work. The fellowship is based at Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California.