Jane Luu - Professional Life

Professional Life

After receiving her doctorate, Luu worked as a professor at Harvard University, since 1994. Luu also served as a professor at Leiden University in the Netherlands. Following her time in Europe, Luu returned to the United States and works on instrumentation as a Senior Scientist at Lincoln Laboratory at MIT.

In December 2004, Luu and Jewitt reported the discovery of crystalline water ice on Quaoar, which was at the time the largest known Kuiper Belt object. They also found indications of ammonia hydrate. Their report theorized that the ice likely formed underground, becoming exposed after a collision with another Kuiper Belt object sometime in the last few million years.

In 2012, she won (along with David C. Jewitt of the University of California at Los Angeles) the Shaw Prize "for their discovery and characterization of trans-Neptunian bodies, an archeological treasure dating back to the formation of the solar system and the long-sought source of short period comets" and the Kavli Prize (shared with Jewitt and Michael Brown) “for discovering and characterizing the Kuiper Belt and its largest members, work that led to a major advance in the understanding of the history of our planetary system.”.

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