---

subsurface habitability

Subsurface microbial communities on Earth harness redox reactions to drive their metabolisms. I am interested in how the chemical energy sources for redox reactions--oxidants and reductants--are produced within the crusts of terrestrial planets such as Earth and Mars. H2 can be produced via serpentinization, radiolysis, or cataclasis. Radiolysis also produces complimentary soluble oxidants that can be reacted with H2 and other reductants. Some of these compounds can be locked in clathrate hydrates and could have warmed the ancient martian atmosphere upon major clathrate release. I am interested in the production, transport, and storage of oxidizing and reducing compounds in crusts and how these processes interact with atmospheres, geothermal heat, and impact processes to affect planetary habitability on Earth and Mars. We have shown that Noachian Mars likely hosted a long-lived habitable subsurface environment that microbes could have existed in, if life ever arose on Mars. I am interested in exploring megabreccia, crater central peaks, and faulted rocks on Mars as windows into the subsurface. These rock types are good targets for investigating biosignatures, as some of them come from the longest lived habitable environment on Mars.

---

Remote sensing of Mars

Hyperspectral imagery of Mars from OMEGA and CRISM has allowed us to detect mineral distributions that inform our interpretations of the planet's geologic history. I am interested in refining our understanding of the geologic history of Mars using new methods of hyperspectral image analysis, including Dynamic Aperture Factor Analysis/Target Transformation (DAFA/TT). This involves determining the processes that produced diverse alteration minerals across the planet's surface. 

---

exoplanet Atmospheres

I am interested in studying exoplanet atmospheres using Kepler and spectral telescopic observations. 

Transit, Secondary Eclipse, and Phase Curve Analysis to Characterize Kepler Exoplanets ​

---