Luisa María Lara

In 2016 she participated as a scientific and technical researcher on the missions of the space probe Rosetta (ESA) to comet 67P, on BepiColombo (ESA-JAXA) for the exploration of Mercury, and on the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (ESA) to study Jupiter and the Galilean moons. Likewise, she has been part of the scientific-technical definition teams of NASA-ESA space missions to the Saturn system, and of an ESA mission to bring asteroidal material to Earth.

Since 2010, she has been a CSIC Scientific Researcher at the Institute of Astrophysics of Andalusia in the Solar System Department. She has worked at various international institutions, such as the Paris Observatory in Meudon, the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, ESA, and the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan in Tokyo.

In addition, Lara has developed theoretical models of atmospheric composition to analyze the data acquired by the Herschel Space Observatory (from 2009 to 2013) of Titan, Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune. These models aim to explain the origin, evolution, and abundance of water vapor (among other compounds), proposing different hypotheses, from vaporization of micrometeoroids to cometary impacts in these atmospheres.

She attended secondary school in Pinos Puente, took Baccalaureate studies in Íllora, and her University Orientation Course (COU) in Granada. She earned a licentiate in Physical Sciences at the University of Granada in 1989 and received her doctorate in 1993.

Luisa María Lara López (born 9 June 1966) is a Spanish astrophysicist. Since 2010, she has been a Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) Researcher at the Institute of Astrophysics of Andalusia in the Solar System Department.