Dr. Sukrit Ranjan will join LPL as an assistant professor. Sukrit completed his Ph.D. in Astronomy and Astrophysics at Harvard University, where he was the first student to earn a certificate in Origin of Life studies. Sukrit completed his undergraduate work at MIT, majoring in physics and minoring in astronomy and history. In addition to research, Dr. Ranjan values outreach and education.
Sukrit works to constrain the palette of environmental conditions from which life arose on Earth to constrain and guide experimental studies of the origin of life. To search for life elsewhere, he works to determine observational tests by which life on other worlds may be remotely discriminated. In collaboration with experimental colleagues, Sukrit seeks to obtain the critical measurements of fundamental photochemical parameters required to build robust models in support of both goals.