Alex Kling

Affiliation: Planetary Systems Branch (SST)/ Coop BAERI

Email: alexandre.m.kling@nasa.gov

Phone: 650-604-5641

Education

Engineering degree from the French Institute for Aeronautics and Space (ISAE Ensma/Supaero)

Research Interests

Alex Kling works with the Mars Climate Modeling Center (MCMC), NASA’s leading research group for the modeling of the Martian atmosphere. His research focuses on atmospheric and flight dynamics: mesoscale modeling of regional circulations on Mars, trajectory and dispersion simulations of flight hardware, the study of mountain waves (i.e gravity waves) within the Martian atmosphere. He has been working on radiative transfer calculations to simulate primitive Martian atmospheres and on the modeling Earth-analogue systems for early Mars. He is involved in hardware design for high-altitude balloons projects and in the development of atmospheric decelerators/probes.

Select Publications

Kling, A. M., Haberle, R.M., McKay,C.P. Bristow T., Rivera-Hernandez, F. (2020) Subsistence of ice-covered lakes during the Hesperian at Gale crater, Mars, Icarus 338

Bouskela, A., Kling, A.M.,  Schuler, T.,  Shkarayev, S., Thangavelautham, J. (2020) Planetary Exploration Using Cubesat Deployed Sailplanes, IAC Proceedings

Bertrand T., Wilson R. J., Kahre M. A., Urata R., Kling A. M., (2020) Simulation of the 2018 Global Dust Storm on Mars using the NASA Ames Mars GCM: a multi-tracer approach, JGR, 125  2020.

Campbell, C. Kling, A. M. [and 8 others] (2020) Estimating the Altitudes of Martian Water-Ice Clouds Above the Mars Science Laboratory Rover Landing Site. Icarus,182

Steakley K. , Murphy J., Kahre M. Haberle R. , Kling A. (2020) Testing the impact heating hypothesis for early Mars with a 3-D global climate model, Icarus 330

Haberle, R.M., Kahre, M.A., Hollingsworth, J.L., Montmessin, F., Wilson, R.J., Urata, R.A., Brecht, A.S., Wolff, M.J., Kling, A.M. and Schaeffer, J.R., (2019) Documentation of the NASA/Ames Legacy Mars Global Climate Model: Simulations of the present seasonal water cycle, Icarus, 333

Pajola, M., Rossato, S., Baratti E., Kling, A. M. (2019) Planetary Mapping for Landing Sites Selection: The Mars case study. In: Planetary Cartography and GIS, H. Hargitai (eds), Springer

Bouskela A., Kling A., Chandra A., Schuler T., Shkarayev S., Thangavelautham J. (2019) Planetary Exploration Using CubeSat Deployed Sailplanes, IAC proceedings

Moores, J. E., Schieber, J., Kling, A. M. [and 12 others] (2016) Transient atmospheric effects of the landing of the Mars Science Laboratory rover: The emission and dissipation of dust and carbazic acid., ASR 58, pp1066-1092

Moores, J. E., Schieber, J., Kling, A. L. M., Haberle, R. M. et al. (2016). Transient atmospheric effects of the landing of the Mars Science Laboratory Rover: The emission and dissipation of dust and carbonic acid. ASR 58, pp1066-1092

Selected Conference proceedings

Kling, A. L. M., Haberle, R. M., McKay, C. P., Bristow, T. F. & Rivera-Hernandez, F. (2017). The ice-covered lake hypothesis in Gale Crater: Implications for the early hesperian climate. The Sixth International Workshop on the Mars Atmosphere: Modeling and Observations. Granada, Spain, 17-20 January.

Work and Research

Alex Kling graduated from the French Institute for Aeronautics and Space (ISAE) with a specialization in space sciences and system engineering.  Since 2013, he has been working at NASA Ames Research Center, California with the Mars Climate Modeling Center (MCMC), which is NASA’s leading research group for the modeling of the atmosphere of Mars. The MCMC uses the Pleiades system, one of the world’s most powerful supercomputers to simulate the state and evolution of the climate and weather systems on Mars. The MCMC mission is to provide modeling support to the NASA’s Mars Exploration Program for atmospheric risk assessment of landed spacecraft, orbiters, for instrument teams and for the planetary science community.

His research focuses on atmospheric and flight dynamics on Mars: the interaction of the regional atmospheric circulations at Gale Crater where NASA’s Curiosity rover landed, the trajectories and dispersion of flight hardware on Mars, and the parameterization of gravity waves (mountain waves) within the Martian atmosphere. He is also involved in high-altitude balloons projects experimenting with instruments concepts in space-like environments. 

Recently, he has been working on radiative transfer calculations to simulate primitive Martian atmospheres and the modeling of Earth analog systems for early Mars, which are related to the potential habitability of ancient Mars.