“The interesting thing is that the lunar crops grew better than the Martian ones,” said Laura Lee, a graduate research assistant at Northern Arizona University who presented the research poster at the 2024 American Geophysical Union, speaking to Space.com. “We had thought that it would be the other way around.”
NAU Astronomy & Planetary Science In the News
Northern Arizona University student studies comet trajectories through work at Lowell Observatory

Photo Credit: Hattie Loper, Arizona Daily Sun
How to find a comet before it hits Earth
Q: How do you find a comet that could pose a threat to Earth but hasn’t passed our planet in the last 200 years or more?
A: You look for its footprint.
This is the basis of research led by Samantha Hemmelgarn, a first-year doctoral student in Northern Arizona University’s Department of Astronomy and Planetary Science.

Crater on Mars named after former NAU department head
A crater on the surface of Mars was recently named in honor of Nadine Barlow, a former chair of the Department of Astronomy and Planetary Sciences at Northern Arizona University (NAU).
NAU professor who died of cancer has Mars crater named after her
FLAGSTAFF, AZ (AZFamily) — Most teachers hope to leave their legacy on their students. However, one professor at Northern Arizona University left hers on the stars in the sky.
Student-led study reveals extraterrestrial explosions may blow hot and cold
Since the formation of Earth approximately 4.5 billion years ago, the convection and release of hot magma in its mantle layer has famously led to some of the deadliest eruptions in history. But what if the same explosions occurred when a geological feature and nearby chemical compounds became too cold?