Aomawa Shields' fascination with stars and the universe beyond our own solar system started with the 1986 film "SpaceCamp." Her curiosity eventually led her to pursue a Ph.D. in astronomy and astrobiology.
Her NASA-backed research focuses on whether planets beyond our own solar system could support life. But Shields’ journey to the stars wasn’t easy. Her new book, “Life on Other Planets: A Memoir of Finding My Way in the Universe,” details her unconventional path to becoming one of the leading scientists in her field. Ahead of her talk at the St. Louis Science Center on Monday, St. Louis Public Radio’s Marissanne Lewis-Thompson spoke with Shields about her book, her work and whether there is other life out there.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Marissanne Lewis-Thompson: What was it about the stars, planets and the galaxies that led you to become an astronomer?
Aomawa Shields: When I would look up at the sky, and that was often, but I looked up so much that I often bumped into things on the street like telephone pools and street signs. And whenever I would look up, all I could think about was what’s out there? What’s out there? Is anything looking back up at me? And how can I find out? And that really started it all for me.
Lewis-Thompson: There was a point in time when you realized you were having this internal conflict between your love of astronomy and your love of the arts when you were working on your Ph.D. the first time. You even had a professor that suggested that you didn’t belong. How did that lead to you doing a complete U-turn and becoming an actress?
Shields: Well it made a big impression on me. Honestly, I had started grad school in astrophysics the first time around almost on autopilot. I thought that’s what you do. You do four years of an undergraduate degree and you’re going to stay in pure science, then you need to get a Ph.D. So I hadn’t really made a conscious choice, and already as an undergrad I had that inner conflict. It was manifesting. I was taking acting courses at MIT and my astronomy and physics courses. But when it came time for grad school, I was like, all right, Ph.D. program is where I got in, and astrophysics that’s what I’ll do, but that inner conflict didn’t magically dissipate just because I was in that program. My attention was divided, and then I started to struggle academically in some courses. And it was in one particular course, and the course was called basic astrophysics, which I always think is the contradiction in terms. There’s nothing basic about astrophysics, but this professor had suggested that I explore other career options, and what I realized is that people will say all manner of things, and I write about this in the book, and some of them can be irrevocably harmful.
Lewis-Thompson: In your new book, "Life On Other Planets: A Memoir of Finding My Place in the Universe," you detail how you were able to reconcile that conflict. How were you able to do that?
Shields: It took several pieces of history to coincide for me to be like this is the direction I’m being led to. It took me applying to the astronaut candidate program. I barely met the minimum qualifications, and I didn’t advance to the next level. And I knew without a Ph.D. I wouldn’t. It took me hosting a science TV show and that show getting greenlit for more episodes, and yet they changed the host. I got put in touch with Neil deGrasse Tyson, who recommended getting the Ph.D., and then it also took me realizing that the day job I had taken once I realized I missed astronomy, I took a day job at Caltech working for a space telescope called Spitzer, there was only so far I could go in that job without a Ph.D. myself. So these three things showed me that I needed to return to do that. There was a moment when my husband and I were in Florence, Italy, and he was climbing the steps of the Duomo. I was in the square listening to a band play Dream On. It was the weirdest experience, and I had this moment of surrender. That like all roads are leading to go back and get the Ph.D. It felt like the hardest thing to admit or acknowledge, but I finally was willing to get out of the way — get out of my own way and do what was indicated.
Lewis-Thompson: Your work is so fascinating. Some of it focuses on big questions that we’re all curious about like: Is there life on other planets, and what qualifies as a habitable planet? What have you learned?
Shields: Our work has shown that the surface matters. Even with just an Earth-like atmosphere, it matters. But throughout a pretty large parameter space whether the surface is ice or sand or salty ice or carbon dioxide ice or granite like each surface type interacts with the light from its star in a different way. And that interaction creates energy and heat or feedback that can reflect energy away and cool a planet down. And this is an important interaction that’s quite relevant for climate and how habitable a planet actually is.
Lewis-Thompson: Does that mean that you’ve seen or there’s evidence that there’s life on other planets that you’ve been studying?
Shields: I want to be able to say that and although we can’t say it yet, I am hopeful. Our instrumentation is becoming more and more advanced. There was a time when I would be at conferences and people would speak very skeptically about how much we could see with the James Webb Space Telescope that’s up right now and has brought us these incredible images far beyond our imagination. I remember hearing that overall people saying there’s no way we can really do much with Earth-sized planets with James Webb. We have to wait for the next generation of telescopes. And it could be that we’ll need to use those larger-aperture telescopes, so more collecting area. The larger the mirror, the more light we can see from these really small planets. We might need to use those to actually tell what’s in the atmosphere of a small Earth-sized planet. But we’ve actually discovered Earth-sized planets with James Webb. Just in the last few months. And we hope to take more observations. I’ve understood that they’re being planned this summer that might help us determine what’s in the atmosphere of that small planet. And I don’t think that was anticipated. So this leads me to believe that we could learn a lot more about planets that are potentially habitable and maybe even come closer to answering that question of what’s actually in the atmosphere or on the surface that could tell us unequivocally that life’s there. Like what’s life exhaling into the atmosphere that we know only life can do that.
Lewis-Thompson: As you reflect on this chapter in your life, what would you say to other young girls of color who want to pursue a career in the sciences?
Shields: First, I would say, if you’re middle school age, ages 10-15, we have a workshop for you, and we want you to participate in it. My program, Rising Stargirls, has a workshop starting a couple of weeks and registration is still open, and it’s absolutely free. We will mail you all of the supplies that you need. The art supplies, the astronomy supplies, and we want you to bring your sense of joy and discovery and your personal background and hopes and dreams into what you’re learning, because we believe that who you are is fundamentally critical to what you want to study and how you process what you’re studying. If you are older than middle school age, 20s, 30s, 60s, and you’re a person of color and you want something more for yourself than what you currently have, I’m here to tell you that you can have it. You can have it all. It’s OK if it doesn’t look like what you have seen around you. If you have no role model for what you want to do, you can be your own. If you’re not from a historically marginalized community and you want something more for yourself than you currently have then you too can have it all. There’s no one way to be a scientist. There’s no one way to be an artist. There’s no one way to do anything. It truly is about doing it being you doing it. It also doesn’t take much. I’m not saying you need to quit your job today. This isn’t about making radical steps. There were small incremental steps that I took. It was not a linear path. It was very zigzaggy and all that I needed to be was open and willing.
Event Details:
Date: July 17
Location: St. Louis Science Center’s Omnimax Theater, 5050 Oakland Ave., St. Louis, MO 63110
Time: 7 p.m. Doors open at 6 p.m.
The event is free.
