Amy Williams

Assistant Director

Amy Williams is an associate professor of geology at the University of Florida. Prior to joining UF, she was an assistant professor of geosciences at Towson University. She is an astrobiologist and geobiologist, and her research interests include the formation and preservation of physical and molecular biosignatures in terrestrial environments as an analog for putative biosignature formation on Mars and other worlds. She has been a member of the NASA Mars Curiosity rover science team since 2009, and currently works with the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instrument team as a Participating Scientist to explore the distribution of organic molecules on Mars’ surface. She is also a Participating Scientist on NASA’s Perseverance rover mission, which is collecting samples on Mars that can one day be returned to Earth. Williams has served on multiple committees under the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, including on the Planetary Science and Astrobiology Decadal Survey 2023-2032. She received a 2023 UF Provost’s Excellence Award for Assistant Professors and is a Scialog Fellow. 

Dr. Williams’ role in the Astraeus Space Institute is to oversee the planetary science and astrobiology directives within the institute, including the development and implementation of degrees and certificates specific to space sciences.