Sarah N. Lamm

I am currently a Ph.D. candidate in Geology at the University of Kansas, focusing on analog materials for Mars and Ocean Worlds using Raman spectroscopy, including developing crystallinity calibrations of amorphous silica. 

During my Ph.D. and M.S., I interned at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the summers of 2021 and 2022, and at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in the summer of 2024. During these internships, I evaluated the performance of various machine learning models to classify different types of spectral data (XRD, IR, LIBS, and Raman) from iron-bearing minerals, advancing mineral identification for future ocean world missions. This work will be a part of my Ph.D. dissertation. In the meantime, you can read an extended abstract from the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference while I am writing my dissertation. 

In 2021, I obtained my master’s degree from Kansas State University in Geology. For my master's, I developed a 532 nm Raman chemical calibration for iron- and magnesium-rich chlorite minerals. Chlorite minerals indicate the presence of past water, which could mean potential habitability on other planets, making this highly relevant to planetary research. Additionally, chlorite chemical compositions can serve as a geothermometer, as their composition is partially temperature-dependent, providing insights into Mars' past environmental conditions. 

In 2018, I graduated from Kansas State University with three Bachelor of Science degrees in Chemistry, Geology, and Geography. During my undergraduate years, I was fortunate to be part of the ChemCam (LIBS) team on the Mars Curiosity Rover and spent three summers at Los Alamos National Laboratory. While at LANL, I continued the analysis of manganese-rich sandstones on Mars and contributed to the reworking of the manganese calibration for ChemCam.

My career goal, after completing my doctorate, is to work at a national laboratory conducting planetary research on spatial geochemistry relationships or liquid-rock interactions on the surfaces of Moon, Mars and/or Titan. I plan to use data sets from current or past missions, participate in spacecraft operations, and/or analyze and characterize astromaterials samples. Once I reach mid or senior career level, I want to be a principal investigator of a science instrument on a NASA Flagship mission or be the project scientist of a mission in NASA’s New Frontiers program. 

In addition to my research, I have been actively engaged in science communication since 2013, presenting at or organizing nearly 100 successful events. My outreach events have reached over 10,000 people, primarily in rural Kansas, making science more accessible to communities often overlooked or without nearby science museums. In 2022, I also launched and lead Rocks & Rockets, an annual hands-on science outreach event in my rural Kansas hometown that drew over 500 attendees in its third year.