People Science Organization Education

Dr. Yvonne Pendleton

Yvonne Pendleton is no longer the Chief of the Space Science and Astrobiology Division at NASA Ames Research Center. She has moved to Washington D.C. and is working at NASA Headquarters as the Senior Advisor for Research and Analysis for NASA's new Associate Administrator, Alan Stern. Yvonne is an observational astrophysicist. She received her Ph.D. in Astrophysics from the University of California at Santa Cruz in 1987. She is currently investigating the organic component of the interstellar medium and the incorporation of that material into the early solar nebula. The International Astronomical Union named asteroid 7165 Pendleton to honor her pioneering work tracing the evolution and distribution of organic material from stardust to planetesimals. Serving as Science Advisor to the Director of Science at NASA Ames in 2004-5 and as the NASA Ames Astrobiology Academy Director for Research in 2004, she currently leads the Space Science and Astrobiology Division. She has also worked with many education outreach efforts to create high school level curricula for teachers (including Voyages Through Time developed by the SETI Institute) and as a Project Astro volunteer in local Bay Area schools (through the Astronomical Society of the Pacific). Named Mentor of the year in 1996, she continues to devote much of her free time to the encouragement of students at the high school, college, graduate and post graduate levels.

Selected publications including Dr. Pendleton:

1. Pendleton, Y. J., and Allamandola, L. J., 2002, "Mid-IR Constraints on the Organic Refractory Material in the Diffuse ISM", Ap.J. Suppl, 138, 75-98.

2. Pendleton, Y., S. Sandford, L. Allamandola, A. Tielens, and K. Sellgren, 1994, "Near Infrared Spectroscopy of Hydrocarbon Absorption in the Interstellar Medium", Astrophysical Journal, 437, 683.

3. Sandford, S.A., L.J. Allamandola, A.G.G.M. Tielens, K. Sellgren, M. Tapia, and Y. Pendleton, 1991, "The Interstellar C-H Stretching Band Near 3.4 µm: Constraints on the Composition of Organic material in the Diffuse Interstellar Medium", Astrophysical Journal, 371, 607.

4. Sandford, S., Pendleton, Y.J., and Allamandola, L.J.,1995, "The Galactic Distribution of Aliphatic Hydrocarbons in the Diffuse Interstellar Medium", Astrophysical Journal, 440, 697 - 705.

5. Pendleton, Y., Tielens, A.G.G.M., and Werner, M.W., 1990,"Dust Grain Properties in Infrared Reflection Nebulae", Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 349, pp. 107-119.

6. Pendleton, Y., M.W. Werner, R. Capps, and D. Lester, 1986, "Infrared Reflection Nebulae in Orion Molecular Cloud 2", Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 311, pp. 360-370.

7. Kovacevic, E., Stefanovic, I., Berndt, J., Pendleton, Y. J., and Winter, J. 2004, "Carbonaceous Interstellar Dust Analog: Formation By Reactive Plasma Polymerization", Astrophysical Journal, 623, 242-251.

8. Mason, R., Wright, G., Pendleton, Y., and Adamson, A. 2004, "Hydrocarbon dust absorption in Seyfert 2 and ultraluminous infrared galaxies", Astrophysical Journal, 613, 770-780.

9. Mennella, V., Baratta, G. A., Esposito, A., Ferini, G., and Pendleton, Y. J., "The effects of ion irradiation on the evolution of the carrier of the 3.4 micron interstellar absorption band", 2003, Astrophysical Journal, 587,727

10. Pendleton, Y.J., 1997, "Organics in the Diffuse Interstellar Medium", Origin of Life and Evolution of the Biosphere, 27, 53.

11. Brown, R. H., Cruikshank, D.P., Y. J. Pendleton, and G. Veeder, 1997, "Near IR Spectroscopy of Kuiper Belt Object 1993SC", Science, 276, 937-939.

12. Noll, K. S., Cruikshank, D. P., Roush, T. L., Johnson, R. E., and Y. J. Pendleton, 1997, "Detection of Ozone on Saturn's Satellites Rhea and Dione", Nature, 388, 45.

13. Pendleton, Y. J. 1996, "Organics and Ices in Galactic Dust", in Changing Perceptions of the Morphology, Dust Content, and Dust-Gas ratios in Galaxies, ed. by D.L. Block and J. M. Greenberg, Kluwer:Dordrecht, 135-142.

14. Pendleton, Y. 1995,"Laboratory Comparisons of Organic Materials to Interstellar Dust and the Murchison Meteorite", Planetary and Space Science, 43, 1359-1364.

15. Tegler, S., Weintraub, D., Rettig, T., Pendleton, Y. J., Whittet, D.C.B., and Kulesa, C.A., 1995, " Evidence for Chemical Processing of Pre-Cometary Icy Grains in Circumstellar Environments of pre-Main Sequence Stars", Astrophysical Journal, 439, 279-287.

16. Pendleton, Y.J. and D.C. Black, 1983, "Further Studies on Criteria for the Onset of Dynamical Instability in General Three-Body Systems", Astronomical Journal, 88, No. 9, pp. 1415-1419.

17. Palumbo, M. E., Pendleton, Y. J., and Strazzulla, G., 2000, "Hydrogen Isotopic Substitution Studies of the 2165 cm-1 (4.62 _m) "XCN" Feature Produced By Ion Bombardment", Ap.J.Letters, 542, 890-893.

18. Pendleton, Y. J., A. G. G. M. Tielens, A. T. Tokunaga, and M. Bernstein 1999, "The interstellar 4.62 um band", Astrophysical Journal, 513, 294.

19. Brown, R. H., D.P. Cruikshank, Y.J. Pendleton, and G. Veeder, 1998, "Identification of Water Ice on the Centaur 1997 CU26", Science, 280, 1430.

20. Cruikshank, D. P., T., L. Roush, M. J. Bartholomew, T. R. Geballe, Y. J. Pendleton, S. M. White, J. F. Bell, III, J.K. Davies, T. C. Owen, C. de Bergh,D. J. Tholen, M. P. Bernstein, R. H. Brown, K. A. Tryka, and C. M. Dalle Ore. "The Composition of Centaur 5145 Pholus". 1998. Icarus 135, 389-407.

21. Chiar, J., Adamson, A., Pendleton, Y., Whittet, D.C.B., Caldwell, D. A. and Gibb, E. 2002, "Hydrocarbons, "XCN", and Ices in the Line of Sight Toward the Galactic Center, Astrophysical Journal, 570, 198-209

22. Pendleton, Y. J., 2004, "Hydrocarbons in Meteorites, The Milky Way, and Other Galaxies", "Astrophysics of Dust", ASP Conference Series Vol. 309, (eds.) A.N. Witt, B.T. Draine, & G.C. Clayton, (ASP: San Francisco), 573-587.

23. Kovacevic, E., Stefanovic, I., Berndt, J., Pendleton, Y. J. and Winter, J. 2005, "Carbonaceous Interstellar Dust Analog Candidate",Astrochemistry Throughout the Universe: Recent Successes and Current Challenges, International Astronomical Union. Symposium no. 231, Edited by Dariusz C. Lis, Geoffrey A. Blake & Eric Herbst. Cambridge University Press, 98-103.

24. Keane, J. V.; Pendleton, Y. J.; Allamandola, L. J., 2005, "Refractory carbonaceous material in luminous galaxies: Mid-IR spectroscopic constraints", Astrochemistry Throughout the Universe: Recent Successes and Current Challenges, International Astronomical Union. Symposium no. 231, Edited by Dariusz C. Lis, Geoffrey A. Blake & Eric Herbst. Cambridge University Press, 199-204.

25. Pendleton, Y. J. 1997, "Detection of Organic Matter in Interstellar Grains", in Planetary and Interstellar Processes Relevant to the Origins of Life, ed. D. C. B. Whittet, Kluwer: Dordrecht, 53.

26. Chiar, J.E., Gerakines, P.A.,Whittet, D.C.B., Pendleton, Y.J., Tielens, A.G.G.M., , Adamson, A.J.A., Boogert, A.C.A., 1998, Processing of icy mantles in protostellar envelopes, Astrophysical Journal, 498, 716.Ê

27. Owen, T. Owen, Tobias C.; Cruikshank, Dale P.,Dalle Ore, C. M.; Geballe, T. R. Roush, T. L., de Bergh, C., Meier, Roland, Pendleton, Yvonne J., Khare, Bishun N. , 2001, The Dark Side of Iapetus, Icarus, "Decoding the Domino: The Dark Side of Iapetus", 149, 160-172.

28. Palumbo, M.E., Strazzulla, G., Pendleton, Y. J., and Tielens, A. G. G. M., 2000, " ROCN species produced by ion irradiation of ice mixtures: Comparison with astronomical observations", Astrophysical Journal, 534, 801-808.

29. Brown, R. H., Cruikshank, D. P., Pendleton, Y. J., and Veeder, G. J., 1999, "NOTE: Water Ice on Nereid", Icarus, 139, 374-378.

30. Whittet, D. C. B., Pendleton, Y. J., Gibb, E. L., Boogert, A. C. A. Boogert, Chiar, J. E., & Nummelin, A., 2001, "Observational Constraints on the Abundance of "XCN" in Interstellar Grain Mantles", Astrophysical Journal, 550, 793-798.

31. Brown, R. H., D.P. Cruikshank, Y.J. Pendleton, 1999, " Water Ice on Kuiper Belt object 1996 TO66", Astrophysical Journal Letters, 519, L101-104.

32. Pendleton, Y. J., 1999, "Organics in the ISM: Where do they come from?", in ``Solid Interstellar Matter: The ISO Revolution'', 1999, in Les Houches No 11, L. d'Hendecourt, C. Joblin & A. Jones eds., EDP Sciences, Les Ulis, 119, 120-128.

33. Chiar, J. E., Y. J. Pendleton, T. Geballe and A. G. G. M. Tielens, 1998, " Near Infrared Spectroscopy of the Proto-planetary Nebula CRL 618 and the Origin of the Hydrocarbon dust in the Interstellar Medium", Astrophysical Journal, 507, 281.

Contact information for Dr. Pendleton:

Email: ypendleton at mail.arc.nasa.gov (where you replace the ' at ' with '@' of course)

Telephone: +1 650-604-4391

Fax: +1 650-604-6779

Post: Mail Stop 245-3,

NASA Ames Research Center,

Moffett Field, CA 94035-1000

U.S.A.


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