Dr. Amanda Bosh

Planetary Science

PhD Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1994

abosh@lowell.edu

Dr. Bosh took on the position of Lowell Observatory Operations Manager in 2020, and subsequently the role of Chief Operating Officer in 2022, but her roots at the observatory run deep. Dating back to 1986 she has participated in a variety of research and outreach efforts at Lowell and her resume bulges with achievements that include co-discovering Pluto’s atmosphere and co-founding Lowell’s  Native American Astronomy Outreach Program. 

Dr. Bosh earned her undergraduate degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1987 and then jumped right into MIT’s graduate program. The following year,  she rode aboard the Kuiper Airborne Observatory—predecessor of the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA)—and was part of the team that included scientists from Lowell, MIT, and elsewhere that first directly measured Pluto’s atmosphere.

Upon earning her PhD in 1994, she was awarded a postdoctoral fellowship at Lowell. She held this position until 1997 and after a one-year stint in the Department of Physics at Hofstra University, returned to Lowell as an assistant research scientist. Throughout these years at Lowell she participated in a number of outreach activities. Seeing an opportunity to take astronomy to underserved Native American communities, Bosh teamed with Dr. Deidre Hunter in 1996 to found the program known today as the Lowell Observatory Native American Astronomy Outreach Program.

In 2002 Dr. Bosh accepted a position with Boston University as a senior research associate at Lowell, a position she held until 2009. She then took on the role of lecturer and, later, senior lecturer, at MIT, maintaining an adjunct position with Lowell. During this time, she continued working on occultations of Pluto, pinpointing observing locations that were crucial to SOFIA observations, as well as the New Horizons flyby of Pluto.

In the fall of 2020 she returned to Lowell Observatory full-time.