Purpose of the Program
The NASA Postdoctoral Program (NPP) supports NASA’s goal to expand scientific understanding of the Earth and the universe in which we live.
Selected by a competitive peer-review process, NPP Fellows complete one- to three-year Fellowship appointments that advance NASA’s missions in earth science, heliophysics, planetary science, astrophysics, space bioscience, aeronautics and engineering, human exploration and space operations, and astrobiology.
As a result, NPP Fellows contribute to national priorities for scientific exploration; confirm NASA’s leadership in fundamental research; and complement the efforts of NASA’s partners in the national science community.
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Latest News
Issue 3 of the NPP newsletter features the research of our first NPP Fellow at Wallops Flight Facility, Piotr Domaszczynski; a look at Konstantinos Tsigaridis’s experience at GISS; a fascinating summary of Morgan Cable’s activities at the Microdevices Laboratory at JPL; advice from Dalia Kirschbaum, who transitioned from the NPP to a position at GSFC; and a comprehensive overview of things going on at Ames Research Center, courtesy of Fred Van Wert, the NPP Center Representative at ARC.
Curiosity has always been a driving force in science. In the case of Heidar Thrastarson, curiosity drove him from his home in Iceland all the way to Pasadena, Calif. Thrastarson’s research focuses on extrasolar planets, an interest that spawned during an undergraduate astrophysics class. His curiosity was sparked after selecting extrasolar planets as an essay topic, and his career was born.
In the spring of 2011, Ann Martin watched as scientists shuffled around a conference ballroom, writing information about their products onto paper-covered display boards. Martin hoped to transform those scraps into a resource that would help the climate education community visualize and connect national efforts in climate education.
Dr. Liz Rampe
Imagine yourself weightless, gathering samples on a near Earth asteroid while your fellow crew members circle above in a spacecraft. NASA Postdoctoral Fellow Dr. Liz Rampe no longer has to imagine, she’s lived the experience virtually.
Dr. Max Moreno-Madriñán, a NASA Postdoctoral Fellow at the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) in Huntsville, Alabama, contributes to the SERVIR program. He applies NASA research to the quest to improve coastal water quality, weather forecasting, and air quality.
Useful Information
- Annual application deadlines:
March 1, July 1, and November 1. - For the latest on U.S. airport security procedures, visit the Transportation Security Administration website.
- NASA Postdoc Program postcard (pdf)
- BlueCross BlueShield health insurance benefits: updated annually on July 1.
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