NASA's Carl Sagan Fellows to Study Extraterrestrial Worlds
baa...@earthlink.net
J.D. Harrington
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-2769
jhar...@nasa.gov
Whitney Clavin
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-4673
whitney...@jpl.nasa.gov
RELEASE: 08-218
NASA'S CARL SAGAN FELLOWS TO STUDY EXTRATERRESTRIAL WORLDS
WASHINGTON -- NASA announced Wednesday the new Carl Sagan
Postdoctoral
Fellowships in Exoplanet Exploration, created to inspire the next
generation of explorers seeking to learn more about planets, and
possibly life, around other stars.
Planets beyond our solar system, called exoplanets, are being
discovered at a staggering pace, with more than 300 currently known.
Decades ago, long before any exoplanets had been found, the late Carl
Sagan imagined such worlds, and pioneered the scientific pursuit of
life that might exist on them. Sagan was an astronomer and a highly
successful science communicator.
NASA's new Sagan fellowships will allow talented young scientists to
tread the path laid out by Sagan. The program will award stipends of
approximately $60,000 per year, for a period of up to three years, to
selected postdoctoral scientists. Topics can range from techniques
for detecting the glow of a dim planet in the blinding glare of its
host star, to searching for the crucial ingredients of life in other
planetary systems.
"We are investing in our nation's best and brightest in an emerging
field that is tremendously inspiring to the public," said Jon Morse,
Astrophysics Division director at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
The Sagan Fellowship will join NASA's new Einstein Postdoctoral
Fellowship in Physics of the Cosmos and the Hubble Postdoctoral
Fellowship in Cosmic Origins. All three fellowships represent a new
theme-based approach, in which fellows will focus on compelling
scientific questions, such as "are there Earth-like planets orbiting
other stars?"
"NASA's science-driven mission portfolio, its cultivation of young
talent to pursue cutting-edge research, and the decision to commit
its genius to a question of transcendent cultural significance, would
have thrilled Carl," said Ann Druyan, Sagan's widow and collaborator,
who continues to write and produce.
"That this knowledge will be pursued in his name, as he joins a
triumvirate of the leading lights of 20th century astronomy, is a
source of infinite pride to our family," said Druyan. "It signifies
that Carl's passion to engage us all in the scientific experience,
his daring curiosity and urgent concern for life on this planet, no
longer eclipse his scientific achievements."
A call for Sagan Fellowship proposals went out to the scientific
community earlier this week, with selections to be announced in
February 2009.
"There is an explosion of interest in the field," said Charles
Beichman of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "Now
we are going down a scientific path that Carl Sagan originally
blazed, torch in hand, as he led us through the dark." Beichman is
executive director of NASA's Exoplanet Science Institute at the
California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, which will administer
the fellowship program.
Recently, NASA's Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes have made
landmark observations of hot, Jupiter-like planets orbiting other
stars. The telescopes detected methane and water in the planets'
atmospheres -- the same molecules that might serve as tracers of life
if discovered around smaller, rocky planets in the future. In a 1994
paper for the journal Nature, Sagan and colleagues used these and
other molecules to identify life on a planet -- Earth. They used
NASA's Galileo spacecraft to observe the molecular signatures of our
"pale blue dot," as Sagan dubbed Earth, while the spacecraft flew by.
"Only a select few scientists carry the insight, vision and
persistence to open entire new vistas on the cosmos," said Neil
deGrasse Tyson, astrophysicist and Frederick P. Rose director of the
Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in New
York. "We know about Einstein. We know about Hubble. Add to this list
Carl Sagan, who empowered us all -- scientists as well as the public
-- to see planets not simply as cosmic objects but as worlds of their
own that could harbor life."
NASA's Kepler mission, which Sagan championed in his last years, will
launch next year and will survey hundreds of thousands of nearby
stars for Earth-like worlds, some of which are likely to orbit within
the star's water-friendly "habitable zone" favorable for life as we
know it.
More information about NASA's Sagan Fellowships is available on the
Web at:
http://nexsci.caltech.edu/sagan
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