Office:
My interests span planetary atmospheres, planetary astronomy, space physics, instrumentation, scientific visualization, and science education reform. My current work is focussed on CU's mission to Mars: MAVEN, (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN). I lead the Imaging UltraViolet Spectrograph (IUVS) which performs remote sensing of Mars upper atmosphere. MAVEN's goals are to (1) understand the current state of the Mars atmosphere; (2) determine how atmospheric escape depends on drivers such as the solar wind, solar radiation and dust storms; (3) extrapolate escape back in time to estimate the cumulative atmospheric loss to space. I also continue my work on atmospheric escape from Jupiter's moon Io, whose entire atmospheric is lost and replaced on human timescales. I serve as a Guest Investigator on the JAXA Hisaki mission.
Recent Publications:
WE McClintock, NM Schneider, GM Holsclaw, JT Clarke, AC Hoskins, AIF Stewart, F Montmessin, RV Yelle, J Deighan, “The Imaging Ultraviolet Spectrograph (IUVS) for the MAVEN Mission”, Space Science Reviews, doi:10.1007/s11214-014-0098-7, 2015.
NM Schneider et al., “MAVEN IUVS observations of the aftermath of the Comet Siding Spring meteor shower on Mars”, Geophys. Res. Lett., 42, 4755–4761, DOI:10.1002/2015GL063863, 2015.
NM Schneider et al., “Discovery of diffuse aurora on Mars”, Science 350, DOI: 10.1126/science.aad0313, 2015.