Transcripts of inge_tenkate_ipod_lg

[silence] [music] [music] Inge Tenkate: My name is Inge Tenkate-- my title is Assistant Research Scientist, and I work in the Planetary Environments Laboratory. Astrobiology, I would say, is the field of study that looks for life outside the earth, but also for the origin of life. And-- the way that my work is involved in astrobiology is--I'm looking at organics, and actually, my daily job is focused on developing--or, helping develop instruments that are related to those kind of organic materials, especially organic compounds that are part of life as we know it. Currently, I'm spending most of my time working on an instrument called VAPOR, which analyzes the volatile contents of samples--either from the Moon, or maybe from an asteroid or Mars--by heating the soil sample up at a real slow pace, and then analyzing the gases with a mass spectrometer. Yeah, what I like about the group I'm working in--not only the group related to the instrument--the VAPOR instrument--but the whole group that I'm working in--is that the group consists of both scientists and engineers, and so, we have a really good mix in our group, and a good interaction between the engineers and the scientists. So, the fact that, as a scientist, you actually get to tinker around a little bit as an engineer. And since my background is in engineering, I really like to have that link as well. [beeping] [beeping] [silence] [silence]