Cross-post: Kiana McFadden is the 2023 DPS-NSBP Speaker Awardee

ByTheodore Kareta, DPS Press Officer

Kiana McFadden

Within the partnership between The Division for Planetary Sciences (DPS) of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) and the National Society of Black Physicists (NSBP), Earth and Planetary Systems Sciences (EPSS) section, we recognize Kiana McFadden as the newest DPS-NSBP Speaker Awardee. Kiana is a PhD student in planetary science at the University of Arizona, specializing in the study of small body surfaces. She is currently working with Dr. Amy Mainzer for the study of mainbelt asteroids, using images acquired by the Near-Earth Object Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer (NEOWISE) and Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) space telescopes.

Kiana McFadden’s award-winning talk at the NSBP Fall 2023 meeting, entitled “Size and Albedo Constraints for (152830) Dinkinesh Using WISE Data,” described work that was critical for helping the NASA Lucy mission plan their November 2023 encounter with this small main-belt asteroid.

Read about Kiana's research at

https://www.nasa.gov/missions/lucy/data-from-nasas-wise-used-to-preview-lucy-missions-asteroid-dinkinesh/

DPS is thrilled to invite Kiana McFadden to speak at the 2024 DPS meeting, which will be held in

Boise, Idaho, USA and virtually. 

Learn about and register for the 2024 DPS meeting at

https://dps.aas.org/meetings/future

Read more about the DPS-NSBP award at

https://dps.aas.org/news/2024-dps-nsbp-speaker-awardee-kiana-mcfadden/

AASWomen Newsletter for January 27, 2023

AAS Committee on the Status of Women
Issue of January 27, 2023
eds: Jeremy Bailin, Nicolle Zellner, Sethanne Howard, and Hannah Jang-Condell

[We hope you all are taking care of yourselves and each other. --eds.]

This week's issues:

1. NASA Planetary Science Summer School
2. Peer Review Under Review Workshop
3. National Space Interns
4. Navigating the fluid funding landscape
5. Women scientists at famed oceanography institute have half the lab space of men
6. Job Opportunities
7. How to Submit to the AASWomen Newsletter
8. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWomen Newsletter
9. Access to Past Issues of the AASWomen Newsletter

An online version of this newsletter will be available at http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com/ at 3:00 PM ET every Friday.

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1. NASA Planetary Science Summer School
From:  Joyce Armijo [joyce.e.armijo_at_jpl.nasa.gov]

Now through March 27, 2023, NASA is encouraging applications for its 35th Annual Planetary Science Summer School. Offered by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, PSSS is a 3-month long early career development experience to help prepare the next generation of planetary science and engineering mission leaders.  Participants learn the process of developing a science hypothesis-driven robotic space mission in a concurrent engineering environment while getting an in-depth, first-hand look at mission design, life cycle, costs, schedule and the trade-offs inherent in each.

Science and engineering doctoral candidates, recent Ph.D.’s, postdocs, junior faculty, and certain master’s degree students, who are U.S. Citizens or legal permanent residents (and a very limited number of Foreign Nationals from non-designated countries), are eligible.  There is no charge to attend, and applicants from diverse backgrounds are particularly encouraged to apply.  Diversity, equity and inclusion are important to us, and we strive to create a welcoming environment where participants’ contributions and unique perspectives are valued.

Register for a PSSS Application Q&A Webinar on February 8, 2023 from 8-9 am Pacific Time at

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSewGtBj8v9hRTgKNB-YwLhYMUuo17jIPqlzc4yZY9AsIaVorg/viewform

To apply and learn more about the NASA Science Mission Design Schools, go to

https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/edu/intern/apply/nasa-science-mission-design-schools/

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2. Peer Review Under Review Workshop
From: Jeremy Bailin [jbailin_at_ua.edu]

This workshop will bring together experts from a large number of organizations and facilities [ in the astronomy field] to discuss the state of peer review and the ways forward for a digital and interconnected science community. The workshop will be divided in 4 main sessions (Peer review at large, Methodologies, Diversity,Equity and Inclusion in peer review, and Concrete examples) and it will include ample time for discussion.

The workshop will be held February 6 - 10, 2023 and the deadline for on-line registration is January 31.

Learn more and register at

https://www.eso.org/sci/meetings/2023/PRUR.html

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3. National Space Interns
From: Kathryn Williamson [kw0003c_at_uah.edu]

Vice President Kamala Harris has expressed interest in diversifying the STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) workforce, especially the aerospace workforce. She has created a program in collaboration with a few industry organizations that will give a few thousand students stem internships by the year 2030. Applications are due February 4th.

Learn more and register at

https://swf2030.org/national-space-interns/ 

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4. Navigating the fluid funding landscape
From:  Nicolle Zellner [nzellner_at_albion.edu]

Holly Barnard (CU-Boulder) wrote a short communication about federal funding opportunities that was published in the Journal of Hydrology. Titled “Navigating the fluid funding landscape”. The article has practical advice that’s applicable to all field.

Read more at

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0022169422014792

[Eds. Note: Access requires a subscription to the journal through your institution or otherwise.]

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5. Women scientists at famed oceanography institute have half the lab space of men
From: Jeremy Bailin [jbailin_at_ua.edu]

By Meredith Wadman

Women constitute 26% of the scientists at the prestigious Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO) at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), but only hold 17% of the space, according to an unprecedented report released last week.

SIO’s 56 women scientists have on average half as much research space and one-third the storage space of their 157 male counterparts, according to the 95-page report by a task force of SIO faculty and staff and UCSD officials. The 16 labs defined as “very large” all belong to men. Women also have less office space. And of 32 coveted storage containers in service yards on site—as opposed to at less convenient remote locations—31 are assigned to men.

Read more at

https://www.science.org/content/article/women-scientists-famed-oceanography-institute-have-half-lab-space-men

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6. Job Opportunities

For those interested in increasing excellence and diversity in their organizations, a list of resources and advice is here:

https://aas.org/comms/cswa/resources/Diversity#howtoincrease

- Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory Chief Operations Officer
  https://www.imsearch.com/open-searches/harvard-smithsonian-center-astrophysics/chief-operations-officer-smithsonian

- Tenured or Tenure-Track Faculty Position in Astronomy and Astrophysics, Penn State University, University Park, PA
   https://science.psu.edu/astro/job-opportunities

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7. How to Submit to the AASWOMEN newsletter

To submit an item to the AASWOMEN newsletter, including replies to topics, send email to aaswomen_at_lists.aas.org .

All material will be posted unless you tell us otherwise, including your email address.

When submitting a job posting for inclusion in the newsletter, please include a one-line description and a link to the full job posting.

Please remember to replace "_at_" in the e-mail address above.

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8. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWOMEN newsletter

Join AAS Women List through the online portal:

To Subscribe, go to https://aas.simplelists.com, and in the "Subscribe" area, add in your name, email address, select "The AASWomen Weekly Newsletter", and click subscribe.  You will be sent an email with a link to click to confirm subscription.

To unsubscribe from AAS Women by email:

Go to https://aas.simplelists.com, in the "My account and unsubscriptions", type your email address. You will receive an email with a link to access your account, from there you can click the unsubscribe link for this mailing list.

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9. Access to Past Issues

https://aas.org/comms/cswa/AASWOMEN

Each annual summary includes an index of topics covered.

IDEA Actions for Our Science Communities

By Nicolle Zellner and Karly Pitman, CSWA co-Chairs

In the past few years, there has been a noticeable shift in how organizations, institutions, and professional societies (among others) are integrating inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility (IDEA), justice, and/or belonging into their daily practices. The Women in Astronomy blog has published numerous posts on this topic while highlighting IDEA advocates and allies. In a recent post, Joan Schmelz, director of the Science and Technology Institute and the NASA Postdoctoral Program at Universities Space Research Association, wrote about her approach for intentionally infusing IDEA culture throughout Astronomy.

There are plenty of resources out there and multiple ways to become educated about best practices, lessons learned, and practical applications. This week, Advancing IDEA in Planetary Science is taking place. The goal of this virtual conference is to “ensure that the planetary science community can take giant leaps in advancing IDEA principles in the workforce over the next decade.” The conference is free and registration is open. Whether a planetary scientist or not, the talks and workshops are sure to be engaging, informative, and inspiring. There will also be two working sessions (Apr. 28 3:30 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. CDT and Apr. 29 from 3:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. CDT) to develop detailed and tangible recommendations for the community.

NASA’s DEIA Strategic Plan (2022-2026) includes multiple key performance goals. For example, one aims to ensure that recruitment plans focus on underrepresented individuals and members of underserved communities and individuals with disabilities. Others aim to build a diverse future science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) workforce by engaging students in authentic learning experiences; implement a continuous pay equity assessment process; and develop and implement automated, analytic products centered around measuring demographic representation and trends (among others). NASA’s Equity Action Plan will focus on increasing integration and utilization of contractors and businesses from underserved communities; enhancing grants and cooperative agreements to advance opportunities, access, and representation for underserved communities; leveraging Earth Science and socioeconomic data to help mitigate environmental challenges in underserved communities; and advancing external civil rights compliance. The National Science Foundation has also recently updated its Strategic Plan (NSF 2022-2026) and diversity is mentioned in several places, drawing from the National Science Board's Vision 2030 recommendations. While many diversity working groups and institutions don't necessarily have the budgets to execute to the scale of the funding agencies, actions at the federal level should serve to inspire individuals and institutions that are funded by NASA in developing their IDEA goals.

The American Astronomical Society itself has also infused IDEA into its own Strategic Plan (2021-2026), with the goal of implementing recommendations made by recent IDEA task forces and consortia. Members of its inclusion committees, CSWA, SGMA, WGAD, and CSMA, meet regularly and collect and publish resources to help advance careers of AAS members in general.

But perhaps the biggest sea change in encouraging the implementation of IDEA practices occurred when the National Academies required that both the Astrophysics and Planetary Science and Astrobiology decadal surveys include a study of the state of the profession. The Astro2020 decadal report, Pathways to Discovery in Astronomy and Astrophysics for the 2020s, urges federal agencies to ensure that their scientific integrity policies address harassment and discrimination by individuals as forms of scientific misconduct. The report also encourages federal funding agencies to establish a consistent format and policy for regularly collecting, evaluating, and publicly reporting demographic data and indicators and then consider using that information in the evaluation of funding awards (e.g.,  individual investigators, project and mission teams, third-party organizations that manage facilities). In a similar vein the just-released Planetary Science and Astrobiology (PS&AB) Decadal Survey, Origins, Worlds, and Life, also recommends collecting data concerning workplace climate, as well as data on the size, identity, and demographics of the PS&AB community; broadening opportunities to advance the state of the profession; and recognizing the need for an inclusive and inviting community free of hostility and harassment. That the decadal reports of both of these closely related scientific communities make similar recommendations means that the importance of a diverse and healthy workforce is finally being acknowledged. Now it’s up to us - members of these communities - to capitalize on this momentum and take action to bring these recommendations to life.

Here are some ways that you can take action in the short term: 

• Participate in upcoming events at the 240th AAS meeting in Pasadena, CA

• CSWA splinter session, June 13, 5:30 - 7 pm PT

• Other sessions TBD, so check the schedule when it’s published

• Volunteer to be a part of the AAS inclusion committees

• CSWA, SGMA, CSMA, WGAD

• Be a mentor on AAS’s new mentoring platform, Mentoring365

Resources:

WGAD, AAS Working Group on Accessibility and Disability 

SGMA, AAS Committee for Sexual-Orientation & Gender Minorities in Astronomy 

CSMA, AAS Committee on the Status of Minorities in Astronomy

CSWA, AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at the American Geophysical Union

International Astronomical Union, Astronomy for Equity and Inclusion

Statement by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific

AASWomen Newsletter for April 5, 2019

AAS Committee on the Status of Women

April 5, 2019

eds: Nicolle Zellner, Heather Flewelling, Maria Patterson, and JoEllen McBride

This week's issues:

1. Cross-post: Guide to Organizing Inclusive Scientific Meetings

2. Town Hall Webinar: Decadal Survey on Astronomy and Astrophysics

3. Deadline Extended: NASA Planetary Science Summer Seminar

4. 10 Unusual Tips For How To Advance Women In STEM, National Academy Of Sciences

5. NASEM Report: Preventing Sexual Harassment

6. Mixed messages about women’s representation in science—and a missing piece of the picture

7. 32 Women Who’ve Changed Life As We Know It 

8. The Failure of NASA’s Spacewalk SNAFU? How Predictable it Was

9. How to Submit to the AASWomen Newsletter

10. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWomen Newsletter

11. Access to Past Issues of the AASWomen Newsletter

DPS Professional Culture & Climate Subcommittee/Announcement of DPS Plenary

The Division of Planetary Sciences (DPS) of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) created the Professional Culture and Climate Subcommittee (PCCS) this past year with the goal of considering and recommending actions that the DPS can take to remove or reduce factors in our professional culture that lead to anything other than scientific merit in consideration of any members's ability to achieve success as a planetary scientist.

Top, L-R: Christina Richey, Nancy Chanover, Rebecca Oppenheimer, & Karen Meech
Bootom, L-R: Guy Consolmango, Sarah Horst, Matthew Tiscareno, & Sona Hosseini

The current members of the PCCS are:

Christina Richey (co-CHAIR, ASRC Federal and NASA HQ)

Nancy Chanover (co-CHAIR, New Mexico State University)

Rebecca Oppenheimer (American Museum Natural History)

Karen Meech (University of Hawaii IFA)

Guy Consolmagno (Vatican Observatory)

Sarah Horst (Johns Hopkins University)

Matthew Tiscareno (SETI Institute)

Sona Hosseini (Jet Propulsion Laboratory)

Women on Spacecraft Missions: Are we moving towards parity with the percentage in the field?

The following blog post was written by Dr. Julie Rathbun, Senior Scientist at the Planetary Science Institute and Professor of Physics at the University of Redlands. The post was originally posted at the Women in Planetary Science blog, and is cross-posted here.

The photo above was taken during the July 2016 meeting of the Science Team for the Europa Multiple Flyby mission. All of the women at the meeting (most of whom are members of the science team) wanted to celebrate the accomplishments of women scientists by taking this photo. It was shot after Dr. Margaret Kivelson was honored by the Project with the Monolith award. During her speech, Margie discussed the challenges she’d faced over her more than 50 years as a scientist, many of those due to being one of a very small number of women scientists. For more about her talk, see https://storify.com/LokiVolcano/margaret-kivelson-at-europa-psg.

The Discovery Program Series: VERITAS (PI: Sue Smrekar, Managed by Jet Propulsion Laboratory)

This post is part of a series discussing the recent NASA Discovery Program mission selections for further refinement. From the 27 proposals submitted in November of 2014, NASA has selected 5 missions for further refinement in the next year. Part 1 of the series focused on the overview of the Discovery refinement selections and an interview with the Lead Program Scientist for the Discovery Program, Dr. Michael New. Part II focussed on the Psyche Mission (PI: Linda Elkins-Tanton, Arizona State University, Managed by JPL). Part III will focus on the NEOCam Mission (PI: Amy Mainzer, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Managed by JPL). Part IV will focus on the Lucy Mission (PI: Hal Levison, Southwest Research Institute, Managed by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center). Part V will focus on the DAVINCI Mission (PI: Lori Glaze, Managed by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center). Part VI will focus on the VERITAS Mission (PI: Sue Smrekar, Managed by Jet Propulsion Laboratory).

Mission Overview: VERITAS

 VERITAS (Venus Emissivity, Radio Science, InSAR, Topography And Spectroscopy) is aimed at understanding one of the most fundamental questions in planetary evolution: Why are the twin planets Earth and Venus so different? Venus and Earth are nearly the same size and bulk compositions. Yet Earth ended up supremely habitable and Venus a sulfurous hell, where the surface temperature is hot enough to melt lead. Understanding how these two planets arrived at their present state is essential to understanding the evolution of rocky planets like Earth, and thus for predicting whether the Earth-sized planets in other solar systems are likely to be habitable. VERITAS will investigate Venus’ geologic evolution by obtaining global maps of high-resolution radar imaging, topography, and near infrared spectroscopy to constrain surface composition. This wealth of data will provide rich opportunities for discovery and inquiry for the next generation of planetary scientists and bring the information available for Venus on par with that for Mars, Mercury, and the Moon. 

The Status of Mental Health in Planetary Science

This is a repost of Dr. Angela Zalucha's piece for the Women in Planetary Science Blog. Please see her original post here.

About Dr. Angela Zalucha: Angela Zalucha received her PhD in atmospheric science from MIT in 2010. She now works at the SETI Institute modeling the dynamics of planetary atmospheres. She currently lives in Boulder, CO where she enjoys skiing and volunteering in the clinic at the Humane Society of Boulder Valley.

I meant to write this article yesterday. That’s not a statement of procrastination. I suffer from depression, which was triggered a few years ago by events directly related to my career. The symptoms of depression are different from person to person. For me, I have to go lay in bed, in silence. Tasks like getting up to heat leftover pizza up in the microwave are insurmountable. So I wasn’t exactly up to the task of writing a blog article, even if it was about the condition I suffer from.

The Discovery Program Series: DAVINCI (PI: Lori Glaze, Managed by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center)

This post is part of a series discussing the recent NASA Discovery Program mission selections for further refinement.  From the 27 proposals submitted in November of 2014, NASA has selected 5 missions for further refinement in the next year. Part 1 of the series focused on the overview of the Discovery refinement selections and an interview with the Lead Program Scientist for the Discovery Program, Dr. Michael New. Part II focussed on the Psyche Mission (PI: Linda Elkins-Tanton, Arizona State University, Managed by JPL). Part III will focus on the NEOCam Mission (PI: Amy Mainzer, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Managed by JPL).  Part IV will focus on the Lucy Mission (PI: Hal Levison, Southwest Research Institute, Managed by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center). Part V will focus on the DAVINCI Mission (PI: Lori Glaze, Managed by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center).

Mission Overview: DAVINCI

The Deep Atmosphere Venus Investigation of Noble gases, Chemistry, and Imaging (DAVINCI) mission would send a probe on a journey down through Venus’ atmosphere, winding up in the planet’s roughest and most geologically complex terrain. The probe would explore the planet’s atmosphere essentially from top to bottom, even the deep layers largely hidden from Earth-based instruments and orbiting spacecraft. DAVINCI would be the first U.S. probe to target Venus’ atmosphere in nearly four decades.

The top-level goals of DAVINCI are to
• Understand the origin of the Venus atmosphere, its evolution and why it is different than Earth and Mars,
• Understand the history of water on Venus and chemical processes at work in its lower atmosphere, and
• Provide insight into tessera origins and their tectonic and weathering history.

DAVINCI is designed to study the makeup of the planet’s atmosphere at a level of detail that has not been possible on earlier Venus missions and to investigate the surrounding surface with cameras. DAVINCI will fly two different types of mass spectrometers, as well as temperature and pressure sensors, to explore how Venus’ atmosphere formed and then changed over time, including what happened to its water. The findings would help scientists understand why Venus and Earth took such different paths as they matured and provide another point of comparison for studies of rocky planets in other star systems. Goddard would manage the mission, which launches in 2021 and descends through the Venus atmosphere in 2023.

The Discovery Program Series: Lucy (PI: Hal Levison, Southwest Research Institute, Managed by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center)

This post is part of a series discussing the recent NASA Discovery Program mission selections for further refinement.  From the 27 proposals submitted in November of 2014, NASA has selected 5 missions for further refinement in the next year. Part 1 of the series focused on the overview of the Discovery refinement selections and an interview with the Lead Program Scientist for the Discovery Program, Dr. Michael New. Part II focussed on the Psyche Mission (PI: Linda Elkins-Tanton, Arizona State University, Managed by JPL). Part III will focus on the NEOCam Mission (PI: Amy Mainzer, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Managed by JPL).  Part IV will focus on the Lucy Mission (PI: Hal Levison, Southwest Research Institute, Managed by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center).

Mission Overview: Lucy

Lucy is a survey of the Trojan asteroids.  Because of their location near Jupiter's orbit, Trojans are a unique resource for deciphering the history of the outer Solar System, which includes the formation of the giant planets and Kuiper belt, planet migration, and delivery of volatiles to the terrestrial planets.  Theories predict that these objects formed throughout the outer planetary system and were captured in their current orbits as the planets grew and moved around. This is evidenced by the fact that we see three distinctly different types of objects in the Trojan swarms. Thus, in order to truly understand what these objects are telling us about the history of the Solar System, we must survey this diversity - Lucy is designed to do just that.  Lucy will flyby at least 4, and probably 5, Trojans covering all the known spectral types in both the L4 and L5 swarms.  It will visit the largest member of a catastrophic collisional family, thereby supplying vital clues about accretional process.  It will also study a near-equal mass binary, which may be a rare survivor from the first generation of planetesimals.  Lucy's payload includes a high resolution panchromatic camera (based on New Horrizon's LORRI), a color imager and NIR spectroscopic mapper (based on New Horrizon's Ralph), and Thermal IR spectrometer (based on OSIRIS-REx's OTES).

The Discovery Program Series: NEOCam (PI: Amy Mainzer, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Managed by JPL)

This post is part of a series discussing the recent NASA Discovery Program mission selections for further refinement.  From the 27 proposals submitted in November of 2014, NASA has selected 5 missions for further refinement in the next year. Part 1 of the series focused on the overview of the Discovery refinement selections and an interview with the Lead Program Scientist for the Discovery Program, Dr. Michael New. Part II focussed on the Psyche Mission (PI: Linda Elkins-Tanton, Arizona State University, Managed by JPL). Part III will focus on the NEOCam Mission (PI: Amy Mainzer, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Managed by JPL).

Mission Overview: NEOCam 

The Near-Earth Object Camera (NEOCam) mission will permit the most comprehensive inventory ever made of our solar system’s small bodies (asteroids and comets) using a space-based infrared survey telescope. NEOCam will detect millions of asteroids, enabling unprecedented understanding of their origins, evolution, and physical properties, and significantly reducing the risk of an unwarned impact on the Earth. NEOCam will detect approximately ten times more near-Earth objects (NEOs) than are known today, making significant progress toward the direction given to NASA by the U.S. Congress to discover more than 90% of near-Earth objects large enough to cause significant regional damage.

The Discovery Program Series: Psyche (PI: Lindy Elkins-Tanton, Arizona State University, Managed by JPL)

This post is part of a series discussing the recent NASA Discovery Program mission selections for further refinement.  From the 27 proposals submitted in November of 2014, NASA has selected 5 missions for further refinement in the next year. Part 1 of the series focused on the overview of the Discovery refinement selections and an interview with the Lead Program Scientist for the Discovery Program, Dr. Michael New.  Part II will focus on the Psyche Mission (PI: Linda Elkins-Tanton, Arizona State University, Managed by JPL). 

Mission Overview: Psyche

How did the Earth’s core and the cores of the other terrestrial planets come to be? We cannot observe them directly, but there is one place in the solar system where we can find answers: The metal asteroid Psyche. Every world explored so far has a surface of ice, rock, or gas. Orbiting in the outer main belt at 3 AU, Psyche is large (240 x 185 x 145 km), dense (as high as 7,000 kg/m^3), and made almost entirely of Fe-Ni metal.

The Discovery Program Series: Introduction and Interview with Michael New (Lead Program Scientist)

As stated on the NASA website, NASA's Discovery Program gives scientists the opportunity to dig deep into their imaginations and find innovative ways to unlock the mysteries of the solar system. When it began in 1992, this program represented a breakthrough in the way NASA explores space. For the first time, scientists and engineers were called on to assemble teams and design exciting, focused planetary science investigations that would deepen the knowledge about our solar system.