NASA Astrobiology Institute Postdoctoral Fellow Program

The NAI Postdoctoral Fellowship Program provides opportunities for Ph.D. scientists and engineers of unusual promise and ability to perform research on problems largely of their own choosing, yet compatible with the research interests of NASA and the member teams of the NASA Astrobiology Institute.

NAI Postdoctoral Fellows become full members of the NAI and, as such, are included in the NAI database and on-line directory, invited to attend and submit abstracts for NAI General Meetings, given access to NAI collaborative tools, and are eligible for additional NAI funding opportunities. NAI Fellows have, therefore, a wide spectrum of opportunities for further collaboration with NAI researchers, as well as the broader scientific community. In this role, NAI Fellows act as 'Ambassadors' amongst the NAI Teams, and between the NAI and the broader scientific community, helping to define and lead the new field of astrobiology.

The NAI Postdoctoral Program is administered by Oak Ridge Associated Universities (ORAU). Note that the NAI does not participate in every application/award cycle. The next award cycle that the NAI will be participating in will be the November 1, 2007 application deadline. For additional information about the program see http://nasa.orau.org/postdoc .

• Year 2007 Fellows
• Year 2006 Fellows
• Year 2005 August Review
• Year 2005 February  Review
• Year 2004 August Review
• Year 2004 February  Review
• Year 2003 August Review
• Year 2003 February Review
• Year 2002 Fellows
• Year 2001 Fellows
• Year 2000 Fellows

Year 2007 Fellows

1. Julien Foriel
   Advisor: Roger Buick, University of Washington , NAI University of Arizona Team
   Topic: Mass-dependent and mass-independent fractionation of selenium isotopes on the early Earth: a probe of planetary oxygenation

Year 2006 Fellows

1. Oleg Abramov
   Advisor: Stephen Mojzsis, NAI University of Colorado
   Topic: Habitability of Early Earth: Thermal Modeling of the Lithosphere During the Late Heavy Bombardment.

2. Jennifer Biddle
   Advisor: Andreas Teske, NAI Marine Biological Laboratory (UNC Chapel Hill)
   Topic: Molecular and Metabolic Characterization of Uncultivated Archael Groups of the subsurface

3. Curtis Cooper
   Advisor: Alex Pavlov, University of Arizona
   Topic:Three-Dimensional Modeling of Habitable Zones and the Paleoclimates of the Terrestrial Planets

4. Matt Pasek
   Advisor: Jonathon Lunine University of Arizona
   Topic: An investigation to the Relationship of Phosphorus and Sulfur Cosmochemistry to the Origin of Life

Year 2005 August Review

1. Sean Raymond (Ph.D., University of Washington)
   Title:  Comet Clouds, Terrestrial Impacts, and the Habitability of Planets in the Galaxy
   Advisor: John Bally , NAI Team: University of Colorado

2. Shannon Hinsa (Ph.D., Dartmouth)
   Title:  Understanding How Psychrobacter sp. 273-4 is Able to Live in Siberian Permafrost
   Advisor: James Tiedje , NAI Team: Michigan State University

3. Melissa Trainer (Ph.D, University of Colorado)
   Title: The Evaluation of CO₂ Clathrate Hydrate as a Possible Sink for Methane in the Martian Atmosphere: Fusing Laboratory Results with a Developing Mars General Circulation Model
   Advisor: Owen B. Toon , NAI Team: University of Colorado

Year 2005 February Review

1. Feng Tian (Ph.D., University of Colorado)
   Title:  Hydrodynamic Escape from Planetary Atmospheres
   NAI Advisor: James Kasting, Pennsylvania State University NAI Team: The Virtual Planetary Laboratory

2. Elise Furlan (Ph.D., Cornell University)
   Title:  Exploring the Birthplaces of Planets at High Angular Resolution in the Mid-infrared from the Ground and from Space
   NAI Advisor: Andrea Ghez, University of California, Los Angeles NAI Team: University of California, Los Angeles

3. Matthew Owen Schrenk (Ph.D, University of Washington)
   Title: High-temperature, High-pressure Microcosms to Study the Bio-molecular Basis for the Upper Temperature Limits to Life
   NAI Advisor: George Cody, Carnegie Institution of Washington NAI Team: Carnegie Institution of Washington

Year 2004 August Review

1. Evgenya Shkolnik (Ph.D., University of British Columbia)
   Title: Hot Jupiters, Hot Spots and Characterization of Extrasolar Planets
   NAI Advisor: Eric Gaidos
   NAI Team: University of Hawaii, Manoa

2. Brandy Toner (Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley)
   Title: Low Temperature Weathering of Hydro-thermal Metal-Sulfide Deposits by Iron-Oxidizing Bacteria in the Deep-Sea
   NAI Advisor: Katrina Edwards
   NAI Team: Marine Biological Laboratory

3. Jinling Huang (Ph.D., University of Georgia)
   Title: Horizontal Gene Transfer in the Evolution of Early Branching Eukaryotes
   NAI Advisor: Johann Gogarten
   NAI Team: Marine Biological Laboratory

Year 2004 February Review

1. Julie A. Huber (Ph.D., University of Washington)
   Title:  The Distribution of Early Life into Geographically Distinct Subseafloor Microbial Habitats: A Metagenomic Strategy
   NRC Advisor: Mitchell Sogin, Marine Biological Laboratory
   NAI Team: Marine Biological Laboratory

2. Margaret C. Turnbull (Ph.D., University of Arizona)
   Title:  Habitable Worlds in the Solar Neighborhood
   NRC Advisor: Sara Seager, Carnegie Institution of Washington
   NAI Team: Carnegie Institution of Washington

3. Jamie E. Elsila (Ph.D., Stanford University)
   Title: Reactions of Aromatics in Extraterrestrial Ice Analogs: Potential Chemical Precursors of Life and False Biosignatures
   NRC Advisor: Max Bernstein, NASA Ames Research Center
   NAI Team: NASA Ames Research Center

4. 4. Aline Gendrin (Ph.D., University of Paris)
   Title:  The Tinto River, Spain: A Terrestrial Analogue for Martian Exobiology
   NRC Advisor: John Mustard, Brown University
   NAI Team: Marine Biological Laboratory

Year 2003 August Review

1. Corien Bakermans
   Title: How Low Can They Grow? Bacterial Physiology at Subzero Temperature
   Advisor: Michael Thomashow, Michigan State University
   NAI Team: Michigan State University

2. Peter Sazani
   Title: Directed Evolution of an RNA Polymerase Ribozyme that Utilizes Highly Activated Monomers
   Advisor: Jack Szostak, Massachusetts General Hospital
   NAI Team: Harvard University

3. Daniel Lessner
   Title: Oxygen Adaptation in the Anaerobic Methanogenic Archaeon Methanosarcina acetivorans
   Advisor: James Ferry, Pennsylvania State University
   NAI Team: Pennsylvania State University

Year 2003 February Review

1. Matthew T. Hurtgen
   Title: The Oxygen Isotopic Composition of Proterozoic Seawater Sulfate: Implications for the Evolution of Earth’s Atmosphere
   Advisor: Andrew Knoll, Harvard University
   NAI Lead Team: Harvard University

2. Giovanna Tinetti
   Title: Light-Curves and Disk-Averaged Spectra for Terrestrial Planets
   Advisor: Victoria Meadows, Jet Propulsion Laboratory
   NAI Lead Team: Jet Propulsion Laboratory-2

Year 2002 Fellows

1. Susannah Malia McGuire Porter
   Title: Constraining the Effects of Preservational Bias on the "Cambrian Explosion": The Early Animal Fossil Record of Australia
   Advisor: Bruce Runnegar, University of California, Los Angeles
   NAI Lead Team: University of California, Los Angeles

2. Geoffrey Garrison
   Title: A Geochemical Study of Marine and Terrestrial Environments Across the Permian-Triassic and Triassic-Jurassic Extinction Events
   Advisor: Peter Ward, University of Washington
   NAI Lead Team: University of Washington

3. Christopher Staples
   Title: The Evolutionary Connection Between Photosynthesis and Nitrogen Fixation
   Advisor: Robert Blankenship, Arizona State University
   NAI Lead Team: Arizona State University

4. Seth Richard Bordenstein
   Title: Genomic Determination of Parasitism and Mutualism in Bacterial Endosymbionts
   Advisor: Jennifer Wernegreen, Marine Biological Laboratory
   NAI Lead Team: Marine Biological Laboratory

5. Michael Smoliar
   Title: Re-Os Isotopic Study of Hydrothermal Processes in Ordinary Chondrites
   Advisor: Conel Alexander, Carnegie Institution of Washington
   NAI Lead Team: Carnegie Institution of Washington

6. Tracy Beth Norris
   Title: The Evolution of Desiccation Tolerance in Cyanobacteria
   Advisor: Richard Castenholz, University of Oregon
   NAI Lead Team: Ames Research Center

Year 2001 Fellows

1. Michelle Minitti
   Title: Chasing Water on Mars: A Geochemical Approach Utilizing Martian Meteorites
   Advisor: Laurie Leshin, Arizona State University
   NAI Lead Team: Arizona State University

2. Alexander Pavlov
   Title: Organic and Sulfur Hazes in the Archean Atmosphere: Climate and Photochemical Consequences
   Advisor: Owen Toon, University of Colorado, Boulder
   NAI Lead Team: University of Colorado, Boulder

3. Charles Boyce
   Title: The Use of Living Plants and Fossil Chemistry to Study the Morphological Patterns and Developmental Processes of Land Plant Evolution
   Advisor: Andrew Knoll, Harvard University
   NAI Lead Team: Harvard University

4. Henry Scott
   Title: Stability of Organic Material in Icy Satellites
   Advisor: Russell Hemley, Carnegie Institution of Washington
   NAI Lead Team: Carnegie Institution of Washington

5. Ruth Ley
   Title: Diversity and Function of the Sulfur-Cycling Community in Hypersaline Microbial Mats
   Advisor: Norman Pace, University of Colorado – Boulder
   NAI Lead Team: University of Colorado – Boulder

6. Sara-Eva Martinez-Alonso
   Title: Identification and Study of Hydrothermal Systems on Mars Through Remote Sensing
   Advisor: Bruce Jakosky, University of Colorado – Boulder
   NAI Lead Team: University of Colorado – Boulder

Year 2000 Fellows

1. Eric Gaucher
   Title: Using Functional Genomics to Infer the Biology and Chemistry of the Last Common Ancestor
   Advisor: Steven Benner, University of Florida
   NAI Lead Team: Scripps Research Institute

2. Yanan Shen
   Title: Environmental Changes in the Context of Biological Evolution During Neoproterozoic on the Yangtze Platform, a Snowball Earth?
   Advis or: Andrew Knoll, Harvard University
   NAI Lead Team: Harvard University

3. Mark Messerli
   Title: Physiological Regulation of Cytosolic pH in a Eukaryotic Acidophile
   Advisor: Mitchell Sogin, The Marine Biological Laboratory
   NAI Lead Team: The Marine Biological Laboratory

4. Marc Kramer
   Title: Linking Earth Science and Astrobiology: Surface Hydrology and Microbial Ecology for Global Semi-Arid Ecosystems
   Advisor: David Peterson
   NAI Lead Team: NASA Ames Research Center

5. Virginia Edgecomb
   Title: Hyperthermophiles of the Hydrothermal Vent Subsurface: Limits of Life and Extraterrestrial Analogs
   Advisor: Andreas Teske, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute
   NAI Lead Team: The Marine Biological Laboratory

6. David Warmflash
   Title: Immunoassay Life Detection Test
   Advisor: David McKay, NASA Johnson Space Center
   NAI Lead Team: NASA Johnson Space Center