MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE SPACE SCIENCE INSTITUTE, BOULDER, COLORADO

Steve Mullins (720 )974-5859 Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo.

CASSINI IMAGING LEADER LOOKS TO UC BERKELEY AND CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES FOR MIND-EXPANDING INSPIRATION

March 12, 2015

Carolyn Porco, veteran planetary scientist and leader of the imaging team on NASA's Cassini mission at Saturn, has accepted dual invitations to be a Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, and a Distinguished Scholar within the Department of Astronomy at the University of California at Berkeley. The Academy is a world-leading museum, research center, and educational institution with the largest, all-digital, planetarium in the country. UC Berkeley is the flagship University of the UC system.

These appointments will find Porco, for extended periods of time during the coming year, among scholars studying subjects that range from life in the Earth's oceans and environmental science at the Academy, to exoplanets and the development of new ways to search for extraterrestrial intelligence at UC Berkeley.

The proximity to such diverse academic pursuits is especially enticing to Porco, who has spent the last decade focused on Saturn and its rings and moons. In particular, her personal research includes the small icy moon, Enceladus, now known to be home to a subsurface ocean with all the hallmarks of a place hospitable to life. She is hoping that new directions of research and public engagement emerge from her time in the Bay Area.

"I am so looking forward to this opportunity to work alongside my colleagues at Berkeley and the Academy", said Porco. "I'm anticipating a great, mind-expanding rush to come from placing what we have found on Enceladus in the broader context of life within our solar system and beyond, and finding new ways to bring these connections to the public."

Her hosts also find the prospects exciting.

Imke de Pater, a planetary scientist and chair of the Department of Astronomy at UC Berkeley said, "All of us, including students and research staff, are really looking forward to having Carolyn join us and working with her on topics of mutual interest while she is at Berkeley."

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Saturn expert and science popularizer Carolyn Porco joins astronomy department