Graduate Student News

Fuda Nguyen is the 2023 recipient of the Curson Travel Award.

The Curson Education Plus Fund in Planetary Sciences and LPL was established by Shirley Curson, a generous donor and friend of LPL, for the purpose of supporting travel expenses outside the state of Arizona during summer break. The award is open to students in the Department of Planetary Sciences and Lunar and Planetary Laboratory who propose to fund study, museum visits, special exhibits, seminars, instruction, competitions, research and other endeavors that are beyond those provided by the normal campus environment and are not part of the student’s regular curriculum during the recipient’s school year.

To donate to the Curson Travel fund, visit the University of Arizona Foundation.

Fuda Nguyen

Fuda just completed his first year as an LPL graduate student, working with advisor Daniel Apai. He will use Curson funds to attend the 2023 Sagan Exoplanet Summer Workshop, Characterizing Exoplanet Atmospheres: The Next Twenty Years, which will be held at CalTech, July 24-28, 2023. He will also attend a half-day (July 29) workshop on EXCALIBUR, a new tool for comparative planetology.

Fuda's research focuses on the monitoring of directly imaged exoplanets and substellar objects such as L and T brown dwarfs in order to understand their atmospheric physics and their formation. He writes that the Sagan Workshop "is an excellent opportunity to learn more about theoretical understanding of exoplanet and solar system planet atmospheres, the current and future observations of exoplanet atmospheres through direct imaging and transmission spectroscopy, the 1D and 3D toolkits used to model these atmospheres, as well as exciting progress in the field and community of researchers." We will report on Fuda's summer travel and research in the fall.

Previous Curson Award Recipients

The Graduate Teaching Assistant Excellence Award is an LPL initiative which is intended to promote, recognize, and reward exemplary performance among graduate teaching assistants assigned to PTYS undergraduate courses. The award consists of funding intended to be used toward travel and expenses to professional meeting chosen by the recipient. All graduate teaching assistants assigned to PTYS courses are eligible, whether or not their home department is PTYS.

Kana Ishimaru

Fall 2022
PTYS/ASTR 170A1, Alien Earths
Instructor: Jessica Barnes

2023 LPL nominee for College of Science Graduate Excellence Award for Teaching and Mentoring

Jada Walters

Fall 2022
PTYS 212, Science and Politics of Climate Change
Instructor: Tommi Koskinen

Rachel Fernandes
Advisor: Ilaria Pascucci

Outstanding Research, Publications, and Presentations.

Rachel defended her dissertation, Exoplanet Demographics Beyond Kepler: Giant Planets with Radial Velocity & Young Planets with TESS, on April 20. The thesis focuses on understanding how planets form and evolve by connecting the properties of their natal environment to the exoplanets discovered around mature stars. Rachel's dissertation work has so far resulted in two first-author papers, with another close to submission.

Rachel has been awarded the Penn State President's Postdoctoral Fellowship and was also named as a Center for Exoplanets and Habitable Worlds Fellow at Penn State.

University of Arizona College of Science Galileo Circle Scholarship

Congratulations to LPL's 2023 Galileo Circle Scholarship recipients: Galen Bergsten, Xiaohang Chen, Nathan Hadland, Mackenzie Mills, Lucas Smith, Jada Walters, and Zoë Wilbur.

Galileo Circle Scholarships are awarded to the University of Arizona's finest science students and represent the tremendous breadth of research interests in the University of Arizona College of Science. The scholarships are supported through the generous donations of Galileo Circle members. Galileo Circle Scholars receive $1,000 and the opportunity to introduce themselves and their research to the Galileo Circle patrons.

Galen Bergsten
Advisor: Ilaria Pascucci

Uses large-scale survey data to study populations of extrasolar planets, including those analogous to Earth, to learn how planets form and evolve throughout the Galaxy.

Xiaohang Chen
Advisor: Joe Giacalone

Seeks to understand the acceleration and transport of solar energetic particles (SEP) associated with fast and wide coronal mass ejections to better predict dangerous SEPs.

Nathan Hadland
Advisors: Solange Duhamel & Christopher Hamilton

Studies planetary analogs in Iceland and elsewhere to evaluate the nature of life and their resulting biosignatures in extreme environments that have similar characteristics as Mars.

Mackenzie Mills
Advisor: Alfred McEwen

Using spacecraft data to derive scientific conclusions from planetary surfaces, characterizing Martian geomorphology and working for an understanding of influence of Martian subsurface features on spatial distributions of surface features.

Lucas Smith
Advisor: Pierre Haenecour

Identifying and investigating presolar stardust grains within meteorites that have experienced aqueous processing, which informs our understanding of conditions that existed during Solar System formation.

Jada Walters
Advisor: Kris Klein

Investigating and identifying instabilities in solar wind plasma, modeling plasma instabilities in one and two dimensions to more accurately model the solar wind in three dimensions in advance of upcoming mission to explore near-Earth plasmas.

Zoë Wilbur
Advisor: Jessica Barnes

Investigating the volcanic and magmatic histories of Apollo 15 and 17 basalts using sample analysis, with a focus on a previously unopened Apollo 17 basalt sample. Measurements will help to answer key questions about how volcanism works on the Moon and potentially on other airless Solar System bodies. The sample analysis is particularly timely as the future NASA Artemis missions will include sample returns.

Adam Battle is the recipient of the 2023 LPL Leif Andersson Award for Service and Outreach.

Adam is a fourth-year graduate student who has demonstrated a commitment to service to his fellow graduate students and to the broader community since he joined LPL in 2019 and, in fact, even before beginning his graduate career.

As an undergraduate student, Adam supported his community as a volunteer at a food pantry and an ambassador for science, participating in activities like star parties and science fairs. As a graduate student, Adam has continued to encourage a passion for science and to support students in their career development.

In 2021, Adam worked with a Tucson Magnet High School student on a science fair project that collected data using the RAPTORS telescope on top of the Kuiper building. Adam wrote detailed manuals so that the student and their teacher could reduce the data on their own. The student won the Smithsonian Institution's Whipple Observatory Award at the Southern Arizona Research, Science and Engineering Foundation science fair and the student was invited to be the keynote speaker at the observatory's lecture series. And he has mentored two undergraduate students, one of which was accepted into a graduate planetary science program.

Adam's service to the department includes his work in organizing the annual Lunar and Planetary Lab Conference for 2020 and 2021. Adam was instrumental in pivoting the 2020 conference to a successful virtual meeting and returned in 2021 to support the in-person off-site conference. In his first semester at LPL, Adam volunteered as webmaster for The Art of Planetary Science (TAPS), a position he continues to hold. In that role, Adam saved the 2020 TAPS exhibit by working with the department webmaster to implement an online web gallery that made the program available to a global audience during the COVID-19 pandemic. His work as TAPS webmaster continues to support improvements to registration and archiving.

In addition to receiving the Andersson Award, Adam was the LPL nominee for the College of Science Graduate Excellence Award for Service. Adam's dedication to a service impact outside of his academic responsibilities embodies the spirit of the Andersson Award for Service.

The LPL Andersson Award for Service and Outreach is awarded annually to a PTYS graduate student in recognition for attention to broader impacts and involvement in activities outside of academic responsibilities that benefit the department, university, and the larger community. The award is named for Dr. Leif Andersson, a scientist who worked at LPL in the 1970s. Support the Andersson Award with a gift.

Previous Leif Andersson Award Recipients

Patrick O'Brien earned his Ph.D. from LPL in December 2022 with a dissertation on The Rise and Fall of Lunar Topography, research which combined theoretical models, high-performance parallel computing, and planetary topography data from Mercury, Ceres, and the Moon. As a student, Patrick developed and combined models of landscape evolution, remote-sensing data processing techniques, and high-performance computing to devise novel approaches for advancing lunar science. In 2020, he developed a landscape evolution model of the lunar surface that answered questions about the rate of space weathering on the lunar surface. Patrick's research as to the source of topographic diffusion of the lunar landscape led to discoveries that updated the canonical model with findings describing diffusivity as both anomalous and non-linear, and that the smallest impactors control the impact-driven diffusion rate. Finally, during his graduate career, Patrick produced the most detailed maps of permanent shadow on the Moon and for the first time cataloged the locations of doubly permanently shadowed regions.

While at LPL, Patrick became known to the planetary science community by participating in opportunities like a JPL Planetary Science Summer School and attending Dawn spacecraft mission team meetings. Patrick presented his work at many professional meetings and participated in outreach events and university service projects like Project POEM, which seeks to foster interest in STEM careers for visually impaired middle and high school students. He acted as a mentor within the UArizona TIMESTEP program, which engages minority students in STEM research. He was also interested in student governance and served as the College of Science representative to the Graduate and Professional Student Council and as the student representative on the committee to select a new Dean for the College of Science.

Patrick is currently a Research Scientist with the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, University of Colorado, Boulder, and a member of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Diviner team.

The Gerard P. Kuiper Memorial Award is presented to students who best exemplify, through the high quality of their research and the excellence of their scholastic achievements, the goals and standards established and maintained by Gerard P. Kuiper, founder of the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory and the Department of Planetary Sciences at the University of Arizona. To support students with the Kuiper Award, visit the University of Arizona Foundation.

Previous Kuiper Award Recipients

Maizey Benner

Correlative Analysis of P-bearing Assemblages in the QUE 97008 and Orgueil Chondrites

Best Student Poster
2022 Microscopy and Microanalysis Meeting

Sarah Sutton

PTYS Ph.D. May 2022

Sinuous Channels East of Olympus Mons, Mars: Implications for volcanic, hydrological, and tectonic processes

Pellas-Ryder Award
Meteoritical Society and Planetary Geology Division of the Geological Society of America

Harry Tang

Invited to be a member of NASA SCoPE (Science Mission Directorate Community of Practice for Education) Team. SCoPE will grow a community of practice and a collaborative effort to communicate NASA science through the creation of inspiring educational materials that are effective, scientifically authentic, and broaden participation of historically marginalized communities.

NSF Graduate Research Fellowship

The purpose of the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) is to ensure the quality, vitality, and diversity of the scientific and engineering workforce of the United States. GRFP recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students who have demonstrated the potential to be high achieving scientists and engineers, early in their careers.

Sam Myers

Assessing the Limitations of NEATM-like Models with IRTF and NEOWISE Data

Advisor: Ellen Howell

Future Investigators in NASA Earth and Space Science and Technology

FINESST solicits proposals for graduate student-designed and performed research projects that contribute to NASA's Science Mission Directorate’s science, technology, and exploration goals.

Mackenzie Mills

Effects of subsurface Fluid Reservoirs on Martian Geomorphology in Utopia Planitia

Advisor: Alfred McEwen

Samantha Moruzzi

Faulting in Pluto's Ice Shell: An Investigation of Local Strain and Stress Concentrations from Refreezing of the Ice Shell Beneath Sputnik Basin

Advisor: Jeff Andrews-Hanna

Emileigh Shoemaker is a 2022 recipient of an Amelia Earhart Fellowship. Emileigh is a fifth-year Ph.D. student advised by Dr. Lynn Carter. Her research focuses on investigating the subsurface of volcanic environments on Mars and Earth using orbital and ground penetrating radar (GPR) systems. Eruptive products like lava flows from effusive volcanic activity or ash and pumice from explosive activity provide a glimpse into the evolution of the interior of a planet. On Mars, volcanic activity is primarily effusive—resulting in shield-like volcanic edifices and extensive lava flows similar to those seen in Hawaii. Explosive activity is less common; however, there is evidence on the surface that these types of eruptions have taken place in the past.

Emileigh uses the Shallow Radar (SHARAD) instrument currently orbiting Mars to investigate the subsurface and the stratigraphy of the largest volcanic province on the planet known as Tharsis. This region has been volcanically active for most of Mars’ history which makes it an excellent site to study the evolution of the planet over time. SHARAD has assisted Emileigh in making measurements of the thickness of lava flows and ash deposits there.

Emileigh has taken part in several NASA field expeditions to the Icelandic Highlands, where she mapped ice buried by ash and pumice from two eruptions of the Askja Volcano using GPR. This area was used to test operational methods to map subsurface ice using these handheld radar systems for future astronauts who will need to access this precious resource during missions on other terrestrial bodies like Mars and the Moon. During these expeditions, Emileigh is able speak to the general public and hopes these interactions will encourage other students to participate in planetary field geology and geophysics in the future. Read more about Emileigh's research with the NASA GIFT Team in Iceland in the Fall 2021 LPL Newsletter.

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