Amy Simon

Amy Simon (born 1971) is an American planetary scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, involved in several missions of the Solar System Exploration Program.[1]

Amy A. Simon
Amy Simon in 2013
Born1971 (age 49–50)
Union, New Jersey, U.S.
Alma materFlorida Institute of Technology
New Mexico State University
Scientific career
FieldsPlanetary atmospheres
Robotic exploration
InstitutionsCornell University
Goddard Space Flight Center

Education

Simon is from Union Township, Union County, New Jersey,[2] where she attended Union High School.[3] She earned a bachelor's degree in Space Sciences from Florida Institute of Technology in 1993[4] and was inducted into Sigma Pi Sigma. She completed her doctoral studies in astronomy at the New Mexico State University in 1998.[5] Upon graduation she became a postdoctoral research scientist at Cornell University.

Career

Simon is a Senior Scientist in the Solar System Exploration Division at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, having joined NASA as a civil servant in 2001. She served as the Chief of the Planetary Systems Laboratory from 2008 to 2010 and the Associate Division Director from 2010 to 2013.[4]

Her scientific research involves the study of the composition, dynamics, and cloud structure in jovian planet atmospheres, primarily from spacecraft observations, and as of 2018 she has authored more than 100 peer-reviewed publications.[6]

Works

Her contributions include the first detailed study of the changing shape of Jupiter's Great Red Spot, as well as the discoveries of several types of waves in the atmosphere of Jupiter.[7][8][9] Her analysis of Voyager 2, Cassini-Huygens, Hubble and New Horizons images led to the discovery of several new classes of Jupiter atmospheric waves.[10][11][12]

Beyond Jupiter, she has studied atmospheric chemistry and dynamics on Saturn, including the north polar hexagon.[13] She was also part of a team that observed Neptune using the Kepler spacecraft Telescope, detecting solar oscillations in light reflected off a planet for the first time.[14][15] Simon is involved in multiple robotic NASA planetary missions. She was a co-investigator on the Cassini-Huygens Composite Infrared Spectrometer (CIRS) and is the Deputy Instrument Scientist for the OSIRIS-REx Visible and IR Spectrometer (OVIRS), as well as for the Landsat 9 Thermal Infrared Sensor-2[16] instrument and the Deputy Principal Investigator for the Lucy (spacecraft) L'Ralph instrument.[17]  

She is Principal Investigator of the Hubble Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy (OPAL) program.[18] Her team discovered a new Great Dark Spot on Neptune with Hubble[19] and have published more than 12 manuscripts from OPAL data.[18] Her work with OSIRIS-REX led to the discovery of hydrated minerals on the surface of Bennu and earned a NASA Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal.[20]

Explorations

Simon also plans future planetary exploration missions. She served on the National Academy of Science's Space Studies Board 2013 Planetary Science Decadal Survey.[21] She has co-led several mission studies for NASA including Flagship class missions to Enceladus and to the Ice Giants, Uranus and Neptune.[22][23] She was Principal investigator for the proposed New Frontiers class Saturn probe mission, SPRITE (spacecraft).

Simon is a member of the American Geophysical Union, the American Astronomical Society, and the Division for Planetary Sciences.

Honors and awards

References
  1. "(84994) Amysimon". Minor Planet Center. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
  2. Amy Simon: Planetary Scientist, NASA. Accessed September 13, 2018. "[Q] Where are you from? [A] I am originally from Union, N. J."
  3. Parkinson, Claire L.; Millar, Pamela S.; and Thaller, Michelle. (editors). Women of Goddard: Careers in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, July 2011, p. 111. Accessed September 13, 2018. "Amy Simon-Miller Union High School, Union, New Jersey"
  4. "Bio - Amy A. Simon". science.gsfc.nasa.gov. Retrieved 2018-08-19.
  5. "NMSU Astronomy Alumni". astronomy.nmsu.edu. October 2015. Retrieved 2018-06-04.
  6. "Google scholar profile: Amy A. Simon". Google Scholar. Retrieved 2018-08-16.
  7. Simon-Miller, A. A; Gierasch, P. J; Beebe, R. F; Conrath, B; Flasar, F. M; Achterberg, R. K (2002). "New Observational Results Concerning Jupiter's Great Red Spot". Icarus. 158 (1): 249–266. Bibcode:2002Icar..158..249S. doi:10.1006/icar.2002.6867.
  8. Simon, A. A; Tabataba-Vakili, F.; Cosentino, R.; Beebe, R. F.; Wong, M. H; Orton, G. S (2018). "Historical and Contemporary Trends in the Size, Drift, and Color of Jupiter's Great Red Spot". Astronomical Journal. 155 (4): 151. Bibcode:2018AJ....155..151S. doi:10.3847/1538-3881/aaae01.
  9. "Jupiter's Great Red Spot Getting Taller as it Shrinks, NASA Team Finds". nasa.gov. 2018-03-12. Retrieved 2018-03-13.
  10. Simon, A. A; Hueso, R.; Inurrigarro, P.; Sanchez-Lavega, A.; Morales-Juberias, R.; Cosentino, R.; et al. (2018). "A New, Long-Lived, Jupiter Mesoscale Wave Observed at visible Wavelengths". Astronomical Journal. 156 (2): 79. arXiv:1807.10692. Bibcode:2018AJ....156...79S. doi:10.3847/1538-3881/aacaf5. PMC 6268009. PMID 30510304.
  11. Simon, A. A; Li, L.; Reuter, D.C (2015). "Small-scale waves on Jupiter: A reanalysis of New Horizons, Voyager, and Galileo data". Geophysical Research Letters. 42 (8): 2612–2618. Bibcode:2015GeoRL..42.2612S. doi:10.1002/2015GL063433.
  12. Simon-Miller, A. A; Rogers, J. H; Gierasch, P. J; Choi, D. C; Allison, M. D; Adamoli, G.; Mettig, H. J (2012). "Longitudinal Variation and Waves in Jupiter's South Equatorial Wind Jet". Icarus. 218 (2): 817–830. Bibcode:2012Icar..218..817S. doi:10.1016/j.icarus.2012.01.022. hdl:2060/20120007841.
  13. Morales-Juberias, R.; Sayanagi, K. M; Simon, A. A; Fletcher, L.N.; Cosentino, R. G (2015). "Meandering Shallow Atmospheric Jet as a Model of Saturn's North-Polar Hexagon". Astrophysical Journal Letters. 806 (1): L18. Bibcode:2015ApJ...806L..18M. doi:10.1088/2041-8205/806/1/L18.
  14. Simon, A. A; Rowe, J. F; Gaulme, P.; Hammel, H. B.; Casewell, S. L; Fortney, J. J; et al. (2016). "Neptune's Dynamic Atmosphere for Kepler K2 Observations: implications for Brown Dwarf Light Curve Analysis". Astrophysical Journal. 817 (2): 162. arXiv:1512.07090. Bibcode:2016ApJ...817..162S. doi:10.3847/0004-637X/817/2/162. PMC 5257274. PMID 28127087.
  15. Gaulme, P.; Rowe, J. F.; Bedding, T. R.; Benomar, O.; Corsaro, E; Davies, G. R; et al. (2016). "A Distant Mirror: Solar Oscillations Observed on Neptune by the Kepler K2 Mission". Astrophysical Journal Letters. 833 (1): L13. arXiv:1612.04287. Bibcode:2016ApJ...833L..13G. doi:10.3847/2041-8213/833/1/L13. S2CID 119477700.
  16. "Landsat 9 Science Instrument Details". landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov. Retrieved 2018-08-19.
  17. "The Lucy Spacecraft and Payload". lucy.swri.edu. Retrieved 2018-08-19.
  18. "Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy Program". stsci.edu. Retrieved 2018-08-19.
  19. Wong, M. H; Tollefson, J.; Hsu, A. I; de Pater, I.; Simon, A. A.; Hueso, R.; et al. (2018). "A New Dark Vortex on Neptune". Astronomical Journal. 155 (3): 117. Bibcode:2018AJ....155..117W. doi:10.3847/1538-3881/aaa6d6.
  20. Hamilton, V.E.; Simon, A.A; et al. (2019). "Evidence for widespread hydrated minerals on asteroid (101955) Bennu" (PDF). Nature Astronomy. 3 (4): 332–340. Bibcode:2019NatAs...3..332H. doi:10.1038/s41550-019-0722-2. hdl:1721.1/124501. PMC 6662227. PMID 31360777.
  21. "Planetary Science Decadal Survey". National Academies. Retrieved 2018-09-07.
  22. "Enceladus: Saturn's Active Ice Moon" (PDF). lpi.usra.edu. Retrieved 2018-09-07.
  23. "Ice Giants Mission Planning". lpi.usra.edu. Retrieved 2018-09-07.
  24. "NASA Agency Honor Awards 2019" (PDF). nasa.gov. Retrieved 2020-09-28.
  25. "Sciences and Exploration Directorate (600) Awards Won". nasa.gov. Retrieved 2018-08-17.
  26. "NASA Agency Honor Awards 2014" (PDF). nasa.gov. Retrieved 2018-08-17.
  27. "MPC/MPO/MPS Archive". Minor Planet Center. Retrieved 18 January 2020.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.