Amanda L. Nahm

Program Officer

Amanda L. Nahm is a Program Officer (PO) in the Research and Analysis (R&A) Group in the Planetary Science Division (PSD) at NASA Headquarters.

She is the Deputy PO for the FINESST (Future Investigators in NASA Earth and Space Science and Technology) program in PSD, which funds graduate student-led research projects at US educational institutions. She is the lead for the Gateway Payload Lunar Working Group and also serves as additional PO support for multiple R&A proposal review panels.

Previously, Amanda held multiple postdoctoral research positions at educational and research institutions (the Lunar and Planetary Institute, the University of Texas at El Paso [UTEP], and the University of Idaho) and was an Alexander von Humboldt Postdoctoral Fellow at the German Aerospace Center’s (DLR) Institute for Planetary Research in Berlin, Germany. Immediately prior to coming to NASA, Amanda was a part-time stay-at-home mom and high school science teacher.

Amanda’s area of expertise is planetary tectonics and during her career she has studied numerous solar system bodies with solid surfaces: Mercury, Mars, the Moon, Enceladus, and Europa. In addition to conducting research, Amanda also taught introductory geology courses at UTEP and advised one master’s student at DLR. She is the lead author of the Lunar Tectonics chapter in the forthcoming New Views of the Moon 2 book and is a contributing author to the Tectonic Landform chapter in Elsevier’s Planetary Tectonism Across the Solar System book.

Amanda earned her bachelor’s degree in geology with a minor in astronomy at the University of Colorado in Boulder and her doctorate in geology at the University of Nevada, Reno. Her dissertation focused on the geologic and tectonic histories of Mars at the local, regional, and global scales.

During her rare free time, Amanda enjoys cross stitching and eating baked goods (especially those that contain chocolate!). She also looks forward to exploring what the DC area has to offer with her husband and two small boys.

Keep Exploring

Discover More Topics From NASA

James Webb Space Telescope

The image is divided horizontally by an undulating line between a cloudscape forming a nebula along the bottom portion and a comparatively clear upper portion. Speckled across both portions is a starfield, showing innumerable stars of many sizes. The smallest of these are small, distant, and faint points of light. The largest of these appear larger, closer, brighter, and more fully resolved with 8-point diffraction spikes. The upper portion of the image is blueish, and has wispy translucent cloud-like streaks rising from the nebula below. The orangish cloudy formation in the bottom half varies in density and ranges from translucent to opaque. The stars vary in color, the majority of which have a blue or orange hue. The cloud-like structure of the nebula contains ridges, peaks, and valleys – an appearance very similar to a mountain range. Three long diffraction spikes from the top right edge of the image suggest the presence of a large star just out of view.

Perseverance Rover

Parker Solar Probe

Juno