Extraterrestrial Materials and Planetary Science
HIGP’s diverse team of researchers use:
- Laboratory analyses of cosmic dust, returned planetary samples, and meteorites
- Remote sensing data from orbital satellites, landers, and rovers
to unravel the mysteries surrounding the origin and evolution of our Solar System.
Extraterrestrial Materials: We study the chemical, isotopic, and structural properties of extraterrestrial materials with analyses conducted in state-of-the-art facilities.
Planetary Science: We develop and use remote sensing data, laboratory experiments, mathematical modeling, and traditional field geology to answer questions about the processes that occur on planetary surfaces and in their interiors.
Click to Read More Collectively, ~$20M of instrumentation supports extraterrestrial materials research. These laboratories are training grounds for students and attract scientists from throughout the University, the nation, and the world. The discoveries we make allow us to glimpse into the very birth of our Solar System and to better understand its geologic evolution. Overview of Planetary Science Research: HIGP faculty have a long history of participation in planetary exploration missions. Current faculty are members of the science teams for NASA’s Mars 2020 rover mission and the OSIRIS-REx asteroid sample-return mission. We also conduct fundamental science research pertaining to the evolution, composition, and workings of the planets and moons of our Solar System. Current projects include the search for water and volatiles on the Moon and asteroids, how space weathering alters the surfaces of planetary bodies and confounds our attempts to decipher their chemical composition, how studying Hawaiian volcanoes can inform us about the origins of Martian volcanoes, and how biological material might be transported to the surface of Saturn’s moon, Titan, from the ocean beneath, such that we might detect it and answer the question: Are we alone?
