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Quicktime interview with Emma:
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By age twelve, Emma Bakes knew she would be a scientist when she grew up; this despite her surroundings. The working class coal-mining town in rural England where Bakes lived offered few role models for the bright, “spotty, geeky” girl who immersed herself in science classes.
In 1999, Bakes found herself at the SETI Institute, where her keen interest in “figuring things out” and her expertise in computer modeling is at work on multiple projects in the Institute’s Center for the Study of Life in the Universe (LITU).
“Every day,...I'm an explorer of undiscovered lands.”
Most those lands are virtual, for Bakes is a computer modeler—still, exploration is precisely the right word for her work.
In an earlier interview in the SETI News, Bakes described her research, “Contemporary astrophysics is perched on the brink of a new era of discovery. It is daring to ask the question ‘can the stuff of life originate between the stars?’ My research involves answering this complex question in a very basic sense.”
As is true for many LITU scientists, Bakes studies “the tenuous matter spread across the vast distances between the stars in our Galaxy.” Her computer simulations complement the work of Institute colleagues like scientist, Max Bernstein, whose research takes place in a laboratory where he physically creates a simulation of the interstellar medium.
Asked about the respective strengths of laboratory work and theoretical modeling, Bakes cites Bernstein’s work on amino acids in interstellar ice and explains, “You can never actually recreate the environment you are simulating in the lab.”
Temperature, pressure and other considerations render interstellar space impossible to replicate in even the best labs. A computer model, however, can do just that, and thus offers an excellent approach to the question of amino acid formation in the interstellar medium.
Conversely, Bakes notes, “the results of Max’s work contained some surprises.” Potential laboratory results are not constrained by the limits of a programmer’s “knowledge or imagination” as is the case in theoretical modeling. The two methods of research work together well however, and Bakes’ computer models both help anticipate and explain colleagues’ lab results.
 Titan [TY-tun] is the largest moon of Saturn and the second largest moon in the solar system, rivaled only by Jupiter's moon Ganymede. |
Bakes’ work is also guiding exploration within our own solar system—her modeling of Titan’s atmosphere has “strongly impacted seminal models by several senior researchers.” Bakes is currently helping them “revise their results in time to make predictions for the Cassini mission.” Comments Bakes, “It is exciting that theory can make an impact in real time for a real mission! Nobody had anticipated that my theory would make such a big difference, so it's been gratifying to be able to make such a significant contribution to the field.”
Driven by a long-standing interest in medicine and a desire to do work having direct “applicability to the well-being of the human race,” last year Bakes directed her abilities towards space medicine.
Volunteer work at the emergency room of her local hospital has helped Bakes develop two devices that use electrical and magnetic fields. One device will allow doctors to contain human body fluids, and another will help prevent the loss of human muscle mass and bone tissue during extended space missions. These inventions, which are being patented through the SETI Institute, as Bakes explains, “are relevant to both long duration space flight, long duration stays in the space shuttle, and have terrestrial applications as well.”
The interdisciplinary nature of the SETI Institute allows Bakes to explore a broad range of “space,” and the questions addressed by her Institute colleagues are inspiring. Recently, on an episode of Are We Alone?, the weekly radio show of the SETI Institute, Bakes speculated on the possibility life off Earth will have a DNA-like coding mechanism. This is a relatively new line of research for her and speaks to the heart of a crucial SETI question, how likely is it that life off Earth might develop and evolve in ways similar to us? We may be unable to rewind the tape of evolution, but perhaps we can run the computer simulation. If so, it may be Bakes’ Sun Microsystems workstation crunching the numbers.
At a Glance
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Currently studying the chemistry and thermodynamics of star-forming regions and the organic chemistry of Titan, Saturn's largest satellite.
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Awarded a grant from NASA's Astrophysics Theory Program to study the organic chemistry of macromolecules in the interstellar medium.
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Hopes to eventually become a professor of astrophysics, doing research and teaching on an equal basis.
Emma's Philosophy on Living
"Know what you want, ask the right questions and don't allow others to limit your horizons."
October 1, 2002