Peter Doran is a professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences and active research scientist at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He is a veteran of numerous expeditions to the Arctic and Antarctic in the pursuit of studying climate and ecosystem change and astrobiology.

He leads a team annually in the McMurdo Dry Valleys of Antarctica as part of the National Science Foundation's Long Term Ecological Research Network, of which the McMurdo site is one of 26 around the world.

Dr. Doran is currently the lead investigator of NASA's Environmentally Non-Disturbing Under-ice Robotic ANtarctiC Explorer (ENDURANCE). He is on various NASA review panels and working groups focused on future exploration of Mars and other locations of astrobiological interest. He is a sitting member of the NASA Subcommittee on Planetary Protection

He has published more than fifty peer-reviewed scholarly articles.

Parts of Dr. Doran's research finding on Antarctic cooling are often incorrectly cited as evidence against global warming theory. He has spoken out about this in various media outlets such as NPR's On the Media, and a New York Times op-ed.

He is a member of American Geophysical Union, the Union of Concerned Scientists, Committee on Space Research, the Geological Society of America, and the American Quaternary Association.