Clare Boothe Luce Associate Professor, Physics & Astronomy
School of Physical Sciences

Climate and habitability of extrasolar planets orbiting low-mass stars. Multi-dimensionalInterests climate models. Interdisciplinary science education and communication. Holistic health and wellness practices for academics and parents of young children.

Team Website

Rising Stargirls (Educational Organization)

Public Engagement Website

Fellow, California Academy of Sciences (2023)
Kibbe Science Endowed Lectureship, Bowdoin College (2022)
Clare Booth Luce Endowed Professorship (2016-2021)
The Origins Project Postdoctoral Award Lectureship, Arizona State University (2016)
Kavli Fellow (2015)

NSF Postdoctoral Fellow (2014–2017)
UC President’s Postdoctoral Fellow (2014–2016)

My research focuses on identifying those planets outside of our solar system—called extrasolar planets—that are most likely to support life. I use computer models to explore and quantify the effects on habitability of wide range of parameters, such as the type of light a planet receives from its host star, the composition of a planet’s atmosphere and surface, and its rotation rate (how long it takes to turn once on its axis, equal to the duration of the planet’s day), eccentricity (the shape of the planet’s orbit), and obliquity (how tilted the planet is on its axis of rotation). My research group uses a hierarchy of models including one-dimensional (1D) energy balance models (EBMs), which are useful for exploring a wide parameter space, and three-dimensional (3D) global climate models (GCMs), helpful for more in-depth explorations of atmosphere-surface interactions. I specifically focus on small planets in the Earth-sized regime, where they have the potential to be rocky, perhaps with liquid oceans on their surfaces.

Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), 2025
Honorary Doctorate, Lewis & Clark College, 2023
NSF CAREER Award, 2018-2023
TED Fellow, 2015

Dr. Aomawa Shields is an astronomer, astrobiologist, classically trained actor, the Clare Boothe Luce Associate Professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of California, Irvine, a writer, and a rest leader. She is the recipient of the National Science Foundation’s CAREER award, and NASA Habitable Worlds, Exoplanets Research Program, and Heising-Simons Foundation grants, among others. A Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences, and a 2015 TED Fellow, Dr. Shields uses her theater background to communicate science to the public in engaging, innovative ways. Her TED Talk “How We’ll Find Life on Other Planets” has garnered over 1.8 million views. Shields also wrote and narrated the popular TED- Ed talk, “Should we be Looking for Life Elsewhere in the Universe?” for young audiences. Shields is a 2025 recipient of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) bestowed by President Joe Biden, after being one of just 23 scientists across the nation nominated by the National Science Foundation each year. She is the founder and director of Rising Stargirls, a program dedicated to encouraging girls of all colors and backgrounds to learn about, explore, and discover the universe using theater, writing, and visual art. Dr. Shields’ unconventional career path has been featured in the books Changing the Equation: 50+ US Black Women in STEM by Tonya Bolden and The Portfolio Life by Christina Wallace. Her memoir, "Life on Other Planets: A Memoir of Finding My Place in the Universe", was published by Viking at Penguin Random House and Little Brown in the UK in July 2023, and will soon be published in China. Shields has presented her book at various national and international events and has been showcased on Good Morning America, MSNBC, Talks at Google and many more. She is the proud mother of first grader and rising stargirl Garland-Rose, who she and husband Steven have deemed the most extraordinary lifeform in their universe.

Life on Other Planets: A Memoir of Finding My Place in the Universe (Viking), 2023

Shields, A, L., Wolf, E. T., Agol, E., Tremblay. P-E. (2025) Increased Surface Temperatures of Habitable White Dwarf Worlds Relative to Main-sequence Exoplanets, ApJ, 979, 45

Venkatesan, V. Shields, A.L., Deitrick, R., Wolf, E. T., & Rushby, A. (2025). A One-Dimensional Energy Balance Model Parameterization for the Formation of CO Ice on the Surfaces of Eccentric Extrasolar Planets. Astrobiology, 25(1).

Silverman, M. Shields, A.L., Howard, J. N., Venkatesan, V., Whitfield, K. (2024) Rising Stargirls: Benefits of a Creative Arts-Based Approach to Astronomy Education for Middle-School Girls from Underrepresented Groups, Astronomy Education Journal, 4(1).

Lobo, A., Shields, A.L. (2024) Climate Regimes Across the Habitable Zone: A Comparison of Synchronous Rocky M-and K-dwarf Planets, ApJ, 972, 71.

Lobo, A., Shields, A. L., Palubski, I., Wolf, E.T. (2023) Terminator Habitability: the Case for Limited Water Availability on M-dwarf Planets, ApJ, 945, 161.

Kossakowski, D., Kürster M., Trifonov, T., Henning, Th., Kemmer, J., Callabero, J.A., Burn, R., Sabotta, S. Crouse, J.S., Fauchez, T.J., Nagel, E., Kaminski, A., Herrero, E., Rodríguez, E., González,-Álvarez E., Quirrenbach, A., Amado, P.J., Ribas, I., Reiners, A., Aceituno, J., Béjar, V.J.S., Baroch D., Bastelberger, S.T., Chaturvedi, P., Cifuentes, C., Dreizler, S., Jeffers, S.V., Kopparapu, R., Lafarga, M., López-González, M.J., Martín-Ruiz, S., Montes, D., Morales, J.C., Pallé, E., Pavlov, A., Schlecker, M., Schöfer, P., Schweitzer, A., Shan, Y., Shields, A., Stock, S., Wolf, E., Zapatero Osorio, M.R., and Zechmeister, M. (2023) The CARMENES search for exoplanets around M dwarfs Wolf 1069 b: Earth-mass planet in the habitable zone of a nearby, very low-mass star, Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Haqq-Misra, J., Wolf, E.T., Fauchez, T.J., Shields, A.L., and Kopparapu, R.K. (2022) The Sparse Atmospheric Model Sampling Analysis (SAMOSA) Intercomparison: Motivations and Protocol Version 1.0: A CUISINES Model Intercomparison Project, Planet. Sci. J., 3, 260.

Rushby, A., Shields, A. L., Wolf, E. T., Lague, M, Burgasser, A. The Effect of Land-Albedo Feedback on the Climate of Land-Dominated Planets in the TRAPPIST-1 System, ApJ, 904, 124.

Palubski, I., Shields, A. L., and Deitrick, R. Habitability and Water Loss Limits on Eccentric Planets Orbiting Main-sequence Stars, ApJ, 890, 30.

Rushby, A., Shields, A. L., and Joshi, M. (2019) The Effect of Land Fraction and Host Star Spectral Energy Distribution on the Planetary Albedo of Terrestrial Worlds, ApJ, 887, 29.

Shields, A. L., Bitz, C.M. and Palubski, I. (2019) Energy Budgets for Terrestrial Extrasolar Planets, ApJL, 884, 2.

Shields, A. L. (2019) The Climates of Other Worlds: A Review of the Emerging Field of Exoplanet Climatology, ApJS, 243, 2.

Shields, A.L., Carns, R.C., (2018) Hydrohalite Salt-albedo Feedback Could Cool M-dwarf Planets, ApJ, 867,1.

Wolf, E.T., Shields, A. L., Kopparapu, R. K., Haqq-Misra, J., Toon, O. B. (2017) Constraints on Climate and Habitability for Earth-like Exoplanets Determined from a General Circulation Model, Astrophysical Journal, 837, 2.

Shields, A. L., Ballard, S., Johnson, J. (2016) The Habitability of Planets Orbiting M-dwarf Stars, Physics Reports, 663:1-38.

Shields, A. L., Barnes, R., Agol, E., Charnay, B., Bitz, C. M., Meadows, V. S. (2016) The Effect of Orbital Configuration on the Possible Climates and Habitability of Kepler-62f, Astrobiology, 16, 6.

Shields, A. L., Bitz, C. M., Meadows, V. S., Joshi, M. M., Robinson, T. D. (2014) Spectrum-driven Planetary Deglaciation Due to Increases in Stellar Luminosity, Astro- physical Journal Letters, 785, 9.

Shields, A. L., Meadows, V. S., Bitz, C. M., Pierrehumbert, R. T., Joshi, M. M., Robinson, T. D. (2013) The Effect of Host Star Spectral Energy Distribution and Ice- Albedo Feedback on the Climate of Extrasolar Planets, Astrobiology, 13, 8.

NSF CAREER Award (2018-2023)

NASA Habitable Worlds grant (2017-2020)

NASA FINESST AWARD (2021-2024)

NASA Exoplanets Research program grant (2023-2026)

Heising-Simons Foundation Grant (2023-2028)

American Astronomical Society

American Geophysical Union

Shields Center for Exoplanet Climate and Interdisciplinary Education (SCECIE)

Link to this profile
https://faculty.uci.edu/profile/?facultyId=6345

Last updated
02/26/2025