UT Astronomer Selected for Frontiers of Research Project

By Nicole Barrios

September 28, 2026

Caroline Morley, associate professor of astronomy in the College of Natural Sciences at The University of Texas at Austin, and her research team recently were among a dozen groups worldwide selected by the Simons Foundation, a philanthropic organization that supports research in mathematics and the basic sciences, for support. The project will involve studying multiscale physics of clouds across the atmospheres of planets beyond Earth. By examining clouds on a wide range of planets outside the solar system, called exoplanets, and exploring physics in extreme environments, Morley and her team hope to deepen scientists’ understanding of fundamental atmospheric processes and apply those insights to improve climate science on Earth.

“We started this project at a Simons Symposium, where we started to talk to each other across disciplines and realized that clouds are the biggest problem in predicting how Earth is actually changing in its climate over time,” Morley said.

Morley, who directs the project, noted that even small differences in how clouds are represented in climate models, including their altitude and their ability to reflect or trap energy, can significantly alter predictions about Earth’s future climate.

Her team’s theoretical studies and simulations of planets will also help researchers look for exoplanets and understand their properties. Morley anticipates this will be particularly useful for those using the Giant Magellan Telescope, for which UT Austin and its McDonald Observatory are founding partners. When its construction is complete, the Giant Magellan will be the world’s largest ground-based telescope and enable scientists (including those at UT) to obtain new clues to the fundamental nature and evolution of the universe — from searching for signs of life on distant exoplanets to investigating the cosmic origins of chemical elements.

“Really, UT is a place where innovation is happening across the board – for the observations, the theory, and the instrumentation,” she said. “That’s really unique. Not that many places in the country offer that – you could list them probably on one hand the number of places that have all three of those things at once.”

Morley said the Simons project team’s approach brings together researchers who rarely collaborate in traditional scientific settings, including Earth climate scientists, planetary scientists and astrophysicists. By drawing on diverse expertise and data sets, researchers can approach shared questions from new perspectives and generate innovative solutions.

Morley will work with a team composed of researchers from across Europe and the U.S., including experts from UCLA, the University of Maryland, the University of Chicago, and the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory in New Jersey, as well as Oxford University in England, Leiden University in the Netherlands, and the Max Planck Institutes for Meteorology and Astronomy in Germany.

The core research team will consist of nine principal investigators, eight postdoctoral researchers and at least two graduate students. Morley also hopes to involve undergraduate Longhorns in some of the research.

“For me, when I was promoted a couple years ago to associate, I started thinking about ways that I could expand and come up with some bigger picture ideas and also things that might both matter for exoplanets and also to people here on Earth – the Earth that we live in,” Morley said. “So, I’m really excited that this resonated with the Simons Foundation.”

Morley’s team is one of 12 groups across the United States funded as Targeted Simons Research Groups by $3 million grants from Simons Foundation International administered by the Simons Foundation. These three-year collaborative projects explore fundamental questions in math and physics topics ranging from dark matter to strange metals to how geometry and physics shape life. Other participating institutions include the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University, and Purdue University.