James Wray, Ph.D.

James Wray is professor of earth and atmospheric sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology. His current research focuses on the geoscience of Mars, not only because it is the planet most obviously Earth-like in terms of potential surface habitability, but also due to the wealth of data available from it. His dream of one day applying this deep knowledge of one nearby planet to understand others far more distant — for instance, planets orbiting other stars — became more feasible when, in 2017 and 2019, the first two small planetary objects from outside our solar system were found passing through it. Upcoming telescope surveys should detect more such interstellar objects, a subset of which may be reachable by spacecraft, providing our first glimpses of macroscopic solids accreted elsewhere in the galaxy.

As a Simons Foundation Pivot Fellow, Wray will work with Karen Meech of the University of Hawaii, who led the paper characterizing the first known interstellar object. He will immerse himself in studies of solar system bodies much smaller than Mars (like asteroids and comets) to better understand how they record the processes of planet formation and space weathering, as well as to gain direct experience proposing and analyzing observations of them with large telescopes. He will analyze data from one of the known interstellar objects to better constrain its basic properties and will work with Meech and colleagues to develop concepts for a potential future mission to a similar target.