Exploring Mars: Dr. Amy Williams on Space, Science & Survival

Susan Wise: Welcome to Stars Launch Pod, space Technology and Research Sciences. I’m your host, Susan Wise and honored to have Dr. Amy Williams, astrobiologist, geobiologist, and Planetary Scientist. Welcome to Launch Pod. 

Amy Williams: Thank you so much for having me on.

Susan Wise: It’s a thrill for us. Um, I wanna ask you a few questions. First of all, tell us just a little bit more about your passion here, about, uh, what you do.

Amy Williams: Oh, absolutely. So, um, I’m a doctor of course, so that is the PhD, doctor and not the MD doctor. Um, turns out that I have like a. I don’t love blood. And so that worked out my favor because I do actually like rocks.

So I’m a geologist and I am a professor at the University of Florida in the geology department. And I’m actually able to apply my love of rocks and of life to studying how life is preserved in rocks. And that’s the Geobiology and astrobiology component of my, my research and my career.

Susan Wise: Well, I have to tell you, I am. I was so excited that you are my first guest. I got to have on after we got back from our vacation, my husband and I went. Glamping. Okay. He promised me it’s glamping, not tent camping, but it was tent camping. So we went to Glacier National Park, we went to Yellowstone and the Badlands.

Susan Wise: We got back just a couple nights ago and talk about places that would be impossible to inhabit. I mean, it just, it looks like another planet when you’re there. Just some amazing sites, but I can imagine, I can only imagine how it would be if you were actually trying to live on another planet. 

Amy Williams: Oh yeah. Um,  I think that that’s one of the, the things that as a as a Mars scientist, you I, I work with data that come back, back from NASA’s Mars Rovers, Curiosity and Perseverance , and that’s actually something I get to pause and think about.

Amy Williams: When we look at these images of the rocks, the, the landscape. You know, a lot of it is taken so that we can conduct scientific exploration on Mars, but it’s really cool to step back and look at those landscape images and think like. You know, one day I suspect we will have humans standing there taking this in through, through their, their space suit. Right? And what an incredibly different experience that will be than just looking at those, those images. But you’re absolutely right. You know, when you go to extreme environments on Earth, it gives you the tiniest taste of what it might be like to be an actual explorer on another world.

Susan Wise: What are you currently working on to further the space industry?

Amy Williams: So, um, as I mentioned, I’m a Professor at the University of Florida.  My research is in how life could be preserved, um, on other worlds, and that’s driven by sort of studying how life is preserved in the ancient rock record on Earth. What I’m doing with NASA is working with the Curiosity and, Perseverance rovers. I joined both Rover teams, uh, at different times, and I have the opportunity to sort of take my of skillset of looking at life preserved in ancient rocks and apply that to how do you search for evidence of life beyond Earth. Now. You know, I spent a lot of time thinking about Mars? um, the type of life that might  have existed on Mars in the past. We do not currently have compelling evidence for life on Mars in the past or the present. Um, but we, We are still interested in exploring this world that had all, the building blocks for life and was very earth-like early on. And so if life took, hold there, is there any evidence for it? Now, if life did not originate on Mars. Separate origin of life from Earth, why? It had all the components that that Earth did. It’s, it’s quite a bit smaller. And so it’s these kinds of question that really drives me I’m passionate, about, because I think it’s important for us to, to continue being explorers in a, in a responsible way. And I think that the kind of, you know, knowledge that we get from this exploration, like to finally know an answer to whether we’re alone in the universe. I think that’s an extraordinary question to pursue. So that’s part what drives me and how I’m feeding into uh, what we’re doing with space exploration and, and our space industry.

Susan Wise: I bet you’re keeping an eye on the one that’s kind of coming our way right now, that it is in the news and they’re all talking about Atlas. Oh,

Amy Williams: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. just a little bit. Yeah. Oh. it’s, yeah, I mean there’s, so I get to focus on Mars, um, all the time. And then like there’s all, obviously all, everything that is going on around just my little focus on Mars. But yes, all kinds of like really interesting,

Susan Wise: Exciting : 

Amy Williams: Things that if you think about it, like until we sort of had this stage of, of scientific exploration, you couldn’t detect these things, right? You couldn’t look for them, you couldn’t study them. And so we’re starting to see. Sort of, I feel like things that we thought were really rare in our solar system maybe are, are less rare than we thought.

Susan Wise: What has been one of your big aha moments?

Amy Williams: So, you know, it’s, It’s funny being, um, being a woman in science, um, I feel like, every day is probably an aha moment where I’m, I feel like I’m constantly learning how to navigate a really dynamic and rapidly changing landscape. I think that the big thing that I would call out is sort of, it, it  was less one particular event, maybe and more of an ability to harness the little, tiny bit of confidence that I had and realize that I could be a scientist, I could be a good scientist, I could, um, actually talk on podcasts, give interviews, um, do good work and present that work. And so I, I remember the first time that I. gave like a science talk. Um, I actually took notes up and anyone who’s ever, you know, given a talk knows like maybe you have cue cards or something, but it’s not really normal to take up your notes with you. I was so anxious and things have evolved for me when I practiced harnessing my confidence, my confidence grew and I became more comfortable. And now I can get up, give talks to hundreds of people, maybe thousands. Uh, and you know, it’s. It’s that scary thing where you kind of clam up anymore. You’re able to kind of speak freely. And I, I would say it wasn’t a particular moment because I’ve seen sort of the progression.

Susan Wise: Mm-hmm. Um,

Amy Williams: I would say one of  the big things was, you know, graduating with my PhD and actually uh, when you get a PhD, you do what’s called a defense. and it’s, uh, less of a you need to defend your science or you don’t get your PhD thing, and more of you’re presenting the final results of your, you know, five years of research and answering questions as a, a nascent scientist, right? Like you were meant to be an independent scientist at that point. And so I think like harnessing my confidence and, and faking it till I made it, that was when I really said like, oh. I can do this and I can speak to the science, I can speak to my, work and I don’t have to be intimidated thinking that everyone knows more than me

Susan Wise: mm-hmm. 

Amy Williams: I actually, get to be an expert in this particular field, so it’s, it’s less a single moment and more of harness your confidence if you have the tiniest amount, which I did, because like that’s just going to grow and it’s going to, it’s gonna pay you back in

Susan Wise: We all start somewhere, you know? And when you started you don’t, you didn’t know nearly what you know now, and that in itself will build confidence. Just knowing, you know, your subject and what you’re talking about and being confident of what you’re talking about, you can tell.

Amy Williams: and really learning, learning that you are the experts. Right? And that’s something I try to instill in my students that. You know, when you go up to give your talk, no one has done this research on this thing, in this place, in this way, you are the expert. So leaning into that and recognizing, um, that you, deserve a seat at the table and now you you get to sit here and get to participate. I think that that’s a really important thing for folks to recognize.

Susan Wise: Amy. I know that there’s probably been hurdles and challenges. Um, what was one of your biggest challenges in, uh, how did you overcome it?

Amy Williams: So what a, a lovely question and I, you know, everyone faces so many challenges, I’ve given a talk recently where I was speaking to undergraduate women in STEM and showing them sort of the ark of my professional career. And then like this sounds you know like a fairytale. I got my PhD, I went to work with NASA. I got a faculty position within two months of starting my postdoc. Um, but what you know, what’s not shown when you do like sort of the highlight reel are all of the challenges that you face. Um, one of the big challenges that I faced was actually transitioning to my role here as a professor at the University of Florida. Prior to that, um, I was actually a professor at Towson University, which is, um, a, a major state institution in Maryland. Um, so go Tigers, Towson is gonna always be near and dear to my heart. So, the first place that I was Faculty member and I had worked with undergraduate researchers and, um, it’s, it has a strong focus on really, um, strong teaching component as well as doing research. And for me, um, I always felt like this goes back to that, to that confidence thing, I always felt that I could be a good teacher and I didn’t have the confidence about my research. And so I said, all right, well what can I, what can I do and be in academia? Well I can be a teacher. And so I did focus on that and learning pedagogical practices and having a really great like classroom environment. Um, and so when it came to getting the position at the University of Florida, um, I actually was hired along with my partner and so these dual career hires are kind of few and far between. They’re hard to get. You just kind of have to be in the right place at the right time. And we did have that opportunity to finally have jobs together in the same state. In the same city, which we didn’t have before. Um, and so stepping up to it, it was all in my head, right, stepping up and saying I can be a researcher at a, a research one institution. UF is a, a huge research institution, so, it, it all goes back to that confidence in like, sort of like. Practicing and building that muscle and knowing like, yes, I can do this. Um, taking those little steps and  reinforcing to yourself that you are capable and don’t let anyone hold you back. Like those are the things that it was all a challenge to kind of rise to this role.

Susan Wise: Right?

Amy Williams: I wanna tell people about it. I want folks to know like, you can rise to this role. You can push yourself, you can achieve things that you never thought were possible, um, in your professional and personal life.

Susan Wise: Amy, when we think about Mars and everything that’s going on in all the science and all the technology that we are attaining, do you think we’re gonna be seeing people living there in our lifetime?

Amy Williams: Ooh. Oh, that’s a great question- So um, so I know that there’s, there’s a big push, um, to improve, um, our ability to, send people in deep space. Right now, they might make the trip maybe, but they’re not gonna, they might, might not make the trip back. And, um, you know, it’s, it, having worked on Mars for my entire professional career, I would say, uh, we cannot underestimate the challenge of living in a world where you have no resources. You have, you, you know, you have a 10 minute delay basically in communicating with Earth if you needed to. There is no, escape shuttle, there is no

Susan Wise: No.

Amy Williams: relief and so, 

Susan Wise: I mean, you’d have to sustain, you’d have to grow your own food. You’d have to be able to take care of yourself if something happened. I mean, it just, it, but we’re still trying.

Amy Williams: Yeah, it’s an infrastructure level that  um, we have not attempted previously. And so I think practicing these kinds of things on the Moon where, where you do have, uh, I guess help is a little bit more accessible, but it’s still quite inaccessible. Um, so yeah, like growing your own food. You need to have all of the systems in place to recycle waste, to generate oxygen.

Um, there’s no water on, there’s no, um, I mean the water is frozen when it is there, but there’s very little, right. If you think about it, there no free air Right. If I get stressed out I can run outside and take a deep breath. And you can’t do that on Mars, right? You’re in a hab, a habitat. You’re probably with other people. Um, and so there’s, there’s I think some of the things that intrinsically take for granted as humans on Earth that gets flipped on its head when you go to another world. 

Susan Wise: Mm-hmm.

Amy Williams: Um, there’s so few people who experience that. Astronauts that have experienced the confined space and sort of  and regulation of your, your, your emotions, your physical, mental health.  

Susan Wise: Right.

Amy Williams: So we have a long way to go. Is it possible, I think absolutely. With additional investment in technology research, and developing all of that, so that I think the most depressing thing would be sending somebody, on a one-way trip, right?

Susan Wise: Yeah.

Amy Williams: Let’s say you did it, and now you’ve got the, the aftermath. So for me, exploration, it is inspiring and it needs to continue to be inspiring. And so that’s where I think you know, bringing people home and their ability to share their experience. It, it’s enormous. And so, um, will we see people on Mars in our lifetime? Possibly Will they have, uh, you know, a habitat set up and a sustained presence. It might take into the next generation to get there, but again, that investment in um, technology and research to how to sustain ourselves and to be healthy on another world, I think that’s paramount.

Susan Wise: What one piece of advice would you share with everyone today?

Amy Williams: Oh, Just one piece of advice? I’m clearly long-winded. I have so many things I think are important. Um, I think that, um, I would say like learning more about what your passion projects are. You know, folks who are listening care about space, space, industry exploration, research, um, Like, learn to read some of the papers that are coming out the fields you’re interested in and see what people on the front lines are actually doing.

Susan Wise:Mm-hmm. 

Amy Williams: Ask a lot of questions and feel free to sort of like build your network of people. So if you’re an aspiring scientist, um, contact researchers, who do things you’re interested in. Contact faculty, just have that communication open and develop that network. So that you have people to sort of support you, uh, in your, in your path, wherever your career is going to take you.

Susan Wise: All right, Amy, thank you so much for joining us today. We really appreciate it. Oh, I wanted to ask you, you said passion project. Do you have a passion project that you’d like to mention?

Amy Williams: I do. And it, it’s somewhere between space and earth. Um, so we actually run a program here at the University of Florida in our geology department called Geo Space. Um, so in the geology sort of realm, we often have sort of a capstone course that is field camp. You were talking about camping, some field camps you go out in a tent and you sleep on the ground and you, work outside for four to six weeks. That’s what I did for my field camp. Um, the field camp we run here is a little bit different and you’re able to stay in a facility. Um, but what Geo Space does is it actually tries to meet students with, um, sort of diverse needs. So, um, you might think if you’re gonna go out camping in the woods. What if you’re in a wheelchair, that’s gonna be very difficult. And so, um, folks who are neurodiverse, folks who have maybe, um, physical disabilities that make it more difficult to do that we run a field camp that enables everyone to have that experience to do the the work, take the  coursework, and we actually run it sort of like, um, a space program where we have people online who are sort of like mission control and the folks on the ground who are astronauts. And anyone with any ability can be in either of  these groups and we’re able to sort of feed off each other doing you know, orbital reconnaissance, sending astronauts out to collect samples and, and, uh, make observations. So, um, my passion project, right is sort of promoting and supporting that form of a field course where everyone is welcome, everyone can contribute and have that experience regardless of ability. I think, you know, as Geosciences evolved. That’s really important thing for us to keep in mind that everyone, 

Susan Wise: I love it. Thank you so much. Thank you, Amy, for joining us on Launch Pod, Dr. Amy Williams, astrobiologist, geobiologist, and Planetary Scientist. Thanks for being on Launch Pod today. I tell you, if you enjoyed our episode, leave us a review and subscribe and in until next time, keep looking up.