Faculty

Research Output

Research

The NASA-funded Astrobiology Center for Isotopologue Research (ACIR) team seeks to discover and document isotope patterns in organic molecules found in meteorites, dissolved in deep Earth fluids, from individual living organisms, within microbial ecosystems, and in organics associated with minerals and ice. Employing advanced computational tools and a rich observation portfolio, they plan to build a predictive understanding of how abiotic and biotic processes and environments are encoded in the isotopes of simple to complex organic compounds.

Katherine (Kate) Freeman obtained her B.A. from Wellesley College and her M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Indiana University. She completed her postdoctoral training at the Skidaway Institute of Oceanography before joining the Geosciences faculty at Penn State. She is currently an Evan Pugh University Professor, with appointments in both Geosciences and Chemistry departments. She is Director of the NASA-funded Astrobiology Center for Isotopologue Research (ACIR), which seeks to advance the analysis and understanding of organic isotopologues using novel mass spectrometry methods, molecular and network modeling approaches, and novel applications in astrobiology and cosmochemistry. She is an elected member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the co-Editor of the journal, Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Science.