Research Bio
Dr. Robert J. (Rob) Lillis is a planetary space physicist and geophysicist at the University of California, Berkeley's Space Sciences Laboratory, where he serves as Associate Director of the Planetary Group. His research focuses on Mars, exploring topics such as atmospheric escape, crustal magnetism, ionospheres, and solar energetic particle radiation. Lillis is the Principal Investigator for NASA's ESCAPADE mission launching in Fall 2025, a twin-spacecraft endeavor aimed at studying Mars' magnetosphere and its interactions with the solar wind . He also contributes to the MAVEN and Emirates Mars missions, enhancing our understanding of Martian upper atmospheric and magnetospheric dynamics. He earned his BA in Theoretical Physics from Trinity College Dublin and completed his PhD in Physics at UC Berkeley.
Research Expertise and Interest
Mars atmosphere, planetary magnetism, MAVEN, solar wind, atmospheric escape
In the News
Two NASA Satellites Will Launch in Early November
Featured in the Media
"Is it worth quadrupling the budget to go from 90% success probability to 99%?" said Robert Lillis, research physicist at the Space Sciences Laboratory. He leads ESCAPADE, Berkeley's $79 million twin-spacecraft mission to Mars, built to test whether low-cost missions can deliver real science.