---
title: "Astrobiologist"
description: "Researches how life began and evolved on Earth and whether it exists elsewhere, from extreme environments on Earth to Mars and ocean moons."
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/astrobiologist"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Astrobiologist

**Category:** Life, Physical, and Social Science · **SOC code:** 19-1029 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 19-1029.04

Researches how life began and evolved on Earth and whether it exists elsewhere, from extreme environments on Earth to Mars and ocean moons.

Also advertised as: Exobiologist; Astrobiology Researcher; Research Scientist (Astrobiology); Geobiologist.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $98,920 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $47.56/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $60,430 to $168,010, with the middle half between $76,800 and $127,670
- **Total US employment:** 55,850
- **Typical entry education:** Doctorate
- **Preparation required:** Considerable preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** +4.7% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 4,300 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 38/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 55,850 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $60,430 |
| 25th | $76,800 |
| 50th (median) | $98,920 |
| 75th | $127,670 |
| 90th | $168,010 |
| Mean (average) | $106,330 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| MD | $121,680 | $115,931 | 4,970 |
| CA | $113,530 | $102,538 | 11,880 |
| DE | $113,400 | $113,618 | Not published by BLS |
| CT | $111,940 | $108,040 | 170 |
| WA | $108,110 | $101,025 | 2,620 |
| MA | $107,100 | $101,270 | 2,930 |
| AK | $106,870 | $104,407 | 370 |
| NJ | $104,750 | $96,273 | 540 |
| ME | $104,570 | $107,749 | 340 |
| NY | $104,120 | $96,478 | 2,520 |
| RI | $101,750 | $99,482 | 100 |
| PA | $100,780 | $103,288 | 1,810 |
| NC | $100,070 | $106,090 | 2,780 |
| GA | $96,820 | $100,547 | 1,230 |
| VA | $96,030 | $94,981 | 1,650 |

37 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 52 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/astrobiologist/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/astrobiologist.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 59,600 in the 2025–2035 base year to 62,400 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 2,800 jobs, or +4.7%. Faster than average: 4.7% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 4,300 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2025–2035.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** Doctoral or professional degree (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Considerable preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** None.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| Master's Degree | 55.0% |
| Bachelor's Degree | 23.4% |
| Post-Doctoral Training | 21.6% |

## What the work involves

- Study microbes from extreme environments in the lab and field
- Analyze rocks and minerals for signs of ancient life
- Run experiments on the chemistry of life's origins
- Model the habitability of planets and moons
- Help define biosignatures for space missions to detect
- Write research proposals and publish findings
- Collaborate with geologists, chemists and astronomers on interdisciplinary teams

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Science — importance 4.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mathematics — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Instructing — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Programming — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Systems Analysis — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Systems Evaluation — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Biology — importance 5.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Education and Training — importance 4.2 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mathematics — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Administration and Management — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Chemistry — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Comprehension — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Expression — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Inductive Reasoning — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Expression — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Information Ordering — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Investigative (I), Realistic (R), Conventional (C).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| I — Investigative | 7.00 |
| R — Realistic | 4.80 |
| C — Conventional | 4.45 |
| A — Artistic | 3.42 |
| E — Enterprising | 2.76 |
| S — Social | 2.62 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| INTJ | 88.6 |
| ISTP | 80.4 |
| ISTJ | 78.3 |
| INTP | 77.2 |
| INFJ | 57.3 |

Best-fitting types: INTJ.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Biologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/biologist) — median $98,920
- [Molecular and Cellular Biologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/molecular-and-cellular-biologist) — median $98,920
- [Wildlife Biologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/wildlife-biologist) — median $76,780
- [Geneticist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/geneticist) — median $98,920
- [Biological Technician](https://nuecareer.com/careers/biological-technician) — median $57,510
- [Microbiologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/microbiologist) — median $87,990
- [Biochemist and Biophysicist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/biochemist-and-biophysicist) — median $127,410
- [Soil and Plant Scientist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/soil-and-plant-scientist) — median $78,850
- [Conservation Scientist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/conservation-scientist) — median $73,010
- [Natural Sciences Manager](https://nuecareer.com/careers/natural-sciences-manager) — median $167,220

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 31.0 Database, August 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2025–2035. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/astrobiologist