Space Science Institute

Please join us in welcoming Jonathan Jiang, an Affiliate Research Scientist. Welcome to the SSI team! Below is Jonathan's bio on his field and specialty.

Follow the link to read Dr. Johnathan Jiang's bio:

SSI - Jonathan Jiang

Please join us in welcoming Niloufar Nowrouzi, an Affiliate Research Scientist. Welcome to the SSI team! Below is Niloufar's bio on her field and specialty.

Follow the link to read Dr. Niloufar Nowrouzi's bio: https://www.spacescience.org/bio.php?emp=NNOWROUZI

Please join us in welcoming Charissa Campbell, an Affiliate Research Scientist. Welcome to the SSI team! Below is Charissa's bio on their field and specialty.

Dr. Charissa Campbell is a planetary atmospheric scientist, focusing on aerosols in the Martian atmosphere. She obtained her MSc and PhD at York University investigating Martian water-ice clouds while on the Curiosity rover operations team. Afterwards, she did postdoctoral work at NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre investigating dust events at the Martian south pole using Mars Climate Sounder Data. They also recently rejoined the Curiosity rover operations team to investigate dust lifting in imagery. She hopes to expand her knowledge of Martian aerosols with orbital and/or surface data, while also exploring ideas such as machine learning, low-cost mission concepts for Mars and aerosols on other planetary bodies.

Please join us in welcoming Ulyana Dyudina, a Research Scientist. Welcome to the SSI team! Learn more about Ulyana's research here: https://www.spacescience.org/bio.php?emp=UDYUDINA

Check out this paper published by multiple authors from SSI!

Frontiers | Inverted radial Alfvén continua: first results from “heliophysics audified: resonances in plasmas” Ultra Low Frequency (ULF) waves with periods of ∼10–1,000 s can lead to space weather impacts such as induced electrical currents in power grids, thus it is ...

Please join us in welcoming Dhanesh Krishnarao, an Affiliate Research Scientist. Welcome to the SSI team! Below is DK's bio.

Dhanesh Krishnarao (DK) holds a Ph.D. in Astronomy from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (2020) - specializing in understanding gas in galaxies and bridging our understanding of the Milky Way with that of a large sample of other galaxies. Now, DK focuses on studying how gas in galaxies is ionized, heated, and maintained in large quantities through observations of absorption and emission lines across many wavelengths.

DK is also a member of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey's fifth iteration (SDSS-V), and leads the Faculty and Student Teams (FAST) initiative, which has sought to attract and retain talented and historically marginalized undergraduate students and faculty within the SDSS collaboration since 2015. FAST forges partnerships where faculty and students at Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) are partnered with SDSS Ambassadors at well-resourced R1 universities and Research Institutes to engage directly with proprietary SDSS-V observations and benefit from long-lasting, sustainable collaborations.

In the classroom, DK prioritizes student self-reflection and growth as a means to assess understanding and work towards mastery as well using community engagement as a means to improve learning outcomes for students in higher-ed and at K-12 schools.

Please join us in welcoming Konstantinos Horaites, an Affiliate Research Scientist. Welcome to the SSI team! Below is Kosta's bio on their field and specialty.

"I am a physicist specializing in the dynamics of plasmas---the charged particles and electromagnetic fields that suffuse outer space. I am also active in the burgeoning research area of "space weather". This is the study of how the Sun can launch plasma across the Solar System, that ultimately influences the Earth's environment and adversely impacts our society's infrastructure. Technologies that can be disrupted or damaged by space weather events include satellites, telecommunications, and even the electrical power grid. I work with satellite observations, theoretical models, and computer simulations to describe the plasma's evolution and interactions.

I received my PhD in Physics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (2019). I then held postdoctoral appointments with the MAVEN satellite team at LASP in Boulder, CO and the Vlasiator simulation group at the University of Helsinki in Finland. In 2024, I returned to Boulder to work as a researcher in the magnetometer team at CIRES, CU-Boulder, in support of scientific instruments on NOAA's satellite missions. I was awarded a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship, to study space weather using kinetic simulations at the UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory in the UK, starting in 2026. I joined SSI with great excitement in 2025, continuing this diverse scientific journey."

Everyone is posting beautiful pictures of auroras, but did you know it's a bit dimmer to the naked eye? Our phone cameras are very good at capturing light, so they make the aurora pop! This photo is a good representation of what our cameras capture versus what we see in person.

Three intense outbursts of solar plasma are heading toward Earth, with dazzling auroras possible across the northern half of the United States over the coming nights. Check out these images captured by our SSI team in Colorado!

Curious about why we see the colors we do in the aurora? Check out the infographic for some insight!

Check out this paper published by SSI's Alicia Vaughan! This paper investigates the youngest preserved unit of the Western Jezero fan, identifying two distinct compositions of boulders that point to unique sources beyond Jezero crater. It shows that these boulders were most likely deposited by a high-energy river system, and thus represent the last stages of aqueous activity involved in the formation of the fan. This work also highlights the ability of using Mastcam-Z multispectral data to confidently identify olivine- and pyroxene-bearing materials across the Martian landscape.

Check out the article here: http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2025JE009159