at Washington University in Saint Louis

The Planetary Chemistry Laboratory is run by Professor Bruce Fegley, Jr. and Dr. Katharina Lodders in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis. We specialize in modeling gas chemistry in the atmospheres of the Earth, terrestrial planets and exoplanets, gas giants and their satellites, and cool stars. Have a look at our Research page to learn more about what we do.

All published peer-reviewed papers by Prof. Fegley and Dr. Lodders are available through the Publications page for your personal use. Posters, talks, and abstracts presented at conferences and meetings will be posted under Presentations (this site under construction).

News items about current research, published papers, and other goings-on in the Planetary Chemistry Laboratory are posted below.

Our site is currently under construction, so come back soon to see the improvements and updated content!

The dome for the 200-inch Hale telescope at Palomar Observatory

Laura Schaefer attended the 42nd annual meeting of the Division of Planetary Sciences of the American Astronomical Society. The meeting was held in Pasadena, CA on October 3 – 8, 2010. Laura gave a talk entitled ‘Equilibrium Chemistry of the Atmospheres of Hot Earth-like Exoplanets’, which is available on our Presentations page.

We have submitted a new paper to the Astrophysical Journal Letters. This paper is entitled ‘Atmospheric Chemistry of Venus-like Exoplanets’ by Laura Schaefer and Bruce Fegley. The paper applies models of atmosphere-lithosphere equilibrium developed for Venus to potential terrestrial-sized exoplanets. The paper makes predictions about the chemical composition of the atmospheres of Venus-like exoplanets, their surface pressures and temperatures, and the mineralogies of their surfaces. A preprint of the paper can be found here.