Dimitra Atri

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Dimitra Atri is a Research Scientist and leads the Mars Research Group at NYUAD Center for Space Science along with Prof. K.R. Sreenivasan. He is the Principal Investigator of the ASPIRE Award for Research Excellence grant to study the atmosphere of Mars with the UAE’s Hope mission. Using data from various space missions, his group is investigating how Mars lost most of its atmosphere, and the possibility of finding extinct or extant life on the planet. He is using data from the UAE’s Emirates Mars Mission and NASA’s MAVEN mission to answer the former, and NASA’s Curiosity and Perseverance rover data to answer the latter. He is also interested in human space exploration and is investigating how radiation in outer space impacts astronauts in long-term space missions, especially for future crewed missions to Mars (Mars 2117). He developing strategies on how to sustainably explore Moon and Mars in the coming decades. Before working at NYU Abu Dhabi, he was a Research Scientist at the Blue Marble Space Institute in Seattle (USA) and a Visiting Scientist at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai (India). He earned his PhD in Physics from the University of Kansas (USA). He is a lead author of numerous publications in international peer-reviewed scientific journals. He regularly serves on committees of NASA and NSF, and referees for major astrophysics, planetary science, and astrobiology journals.