Jonathan Lunine

Who is Jonathan Lunine?

Jonathan I. Lunine is an American planetary scientist and physicist. Lunine teaches at Cornell University, where he is the David C. Duncan Professor in the Physical Sciences and Director of the Center for Radiophysics and Space Research. Having published more than 200 research papers, Lunine is at the forefront of research into planet formation, evolution, and habitability. His work includes analysis of brown dwarfs, gas giants, and planetary satellites. Within the Solar System, bodies with potential organic chemistry and prebiotic conditions, particularly Saturn's moon Titan, have been the focus of Lunine's research.

He is the David Baltimore Distinguished Visiting Scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He is an interdisciplinary scientist on the Cassini mission to Saturn, and on the James Webb Space Telescope, as well as co-investigator on the Juno mission launched in 2011 to Jupiter. He is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and of the American Geophysical Union. He earned a B.S. in Physics and Astronomy from the University of Rochester in 1980, followed by M.S. and Ph.