Scientists at the Planetary Science Institute (PSI) have won more than $5 million in NASA research grants so far in 2008. PSI is a private, non-profit corporation engaged in the exploration of the solar system. PSI is headquartered in Tucson, Arizona.
The 24 funded projects, which are led by 18 PSI scientists, focus on topics that range from mapping landing sites for a Mars science laboratory to determining the densities of comets. The projects also include simulating weathering effects on the Earth’s moon, exploring the topography of selected Saturn moons and studying the geologic history of light-toned layered deposits found in a Martian canyon system.
”The competition for these grants within the scientific community is intense, and winning them is testimony to the quality of PSI investigators and their work,” said PSI Director Mark Sykes.
”The grants also reflect the mutual support that our scientists provide to one another in order to maximize everyone’s success, even on projects in which they’re not directly involved,” Sykes added. “That kind of support and collaboration is part of what makes PSI a very special place.”
Five grants were awarded in the Mars Data Analysis Program for a total of $800,000. An additional five grants, totaling $1.3 million, came from the Planetary Geology and Geophysics program. And another three grants, totaling $900,000, came from the Mars Fundamental Research program.
Several other grants were awarded for projects involving space missions such as NASA’s Cassini-Huygens Mission to Saturn, the Dawn mission to the asteroid belt to study the asteroid Vesta and small planet Ceres, and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Hayabusa mission to a near-Earth asteroid.
”The diversity of research being pursued through these grants, as well as the concentration of PSI scientists in certain research programs, illustrates the important contributions the Institute continues to make in expanding our understanding of the solar system,” Sykes said.
Descriptions of the projects can be found at: https://www.psi.edu/research/funded-projects
The grants were awarded to the following PSI scientists: Paul Abell, Natasha Artemieva, Matthew Balme, Mary Bourke, David Crown, Donald R. Davis, Robert W Gaskell, William K. Hartmann, Keith Holsapple, Kimberly Kuhlman, Melissa Lane, Asmin Pathare, Thomas H. Prettyman, Nalin Samarasinha, Edward F. Tedesco, Stuart J.Weidenschilling, Catherine Weitz, and Rebecca Williams.