Program Scientist
"Dr. Thomas Statler is Lead Scientist for Solar System Small Bodies in the Planetary Science Division at NASA Headquarters, and Program Scientist for multiple missions, including the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART, now completed), the Lucy mission to the Trojan asteroids, the OSIRIS-APEX mission to the asteroid Apophis, and JAXA’s MMX mission to the moons of Mars."
"He earned his Ph.D. in Astrophysics from Princeton University in 1986, and for nearly 20 years was on the faculty of Ohio University, where he was founding director of the university’s Astrophysical Institute."
"Dr. Statler’s research has spanned a range of topics in astrophysics and planetary science, from the collisions of multiple universes,"
(Thats pretty funny really.)
to the structure and dynamics galaxies, to
the spins and orbits of near-Earth asteroids.
(Thats kinda interesting.
Curious what he has to say.)
"An enthusiastic communicator, he has given countless public presentations, including talks, radio shows, webcasts, videos, telescope nights, and stargazing hikes. Asteroid 9536 Statler is named in his honor."
NASA Associate Administrator
"Amit Kshatriya was named the associate administrator by acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy on Sept. 3, 2025. In this role, he serves as the highest-ranking civil servant at the agency, and as a senior advisor to Duffy. Kshatriya leads the agency’s 10 center directors, as well as the mission directorate associate administrators at NASA Headquarters in Washington. He also acts as the agency’s chief operating officer."
(If this thing goes south today?
His head will be the one on the chopping block.)
"Kshatriya previously served as the deputy associate administrator for the Moon to Mars Program in the Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate (ESDMD) at NASA Headquarters in Washington. In that role, Kshatriya was responsible for program planning and implementation for human missions to the Moon and Mars. He directed and led the programs to ensure Artemis and Mars planning, development, and operations were consistent with ESDMD requirements, and served as the single point of focus for risk management."
"Prior to his ESDMD role, Kshatriya served as the acting deputy associate administrator for the Common Exploration Systems Development Division where he directed and provided leadership and integration for the Space Launch System, Orion, and Exploration Ground Systems Programs, as well as associated Artemis Campaign Development Division initiatives linking the agency’s Moon to Mars objectives."
"Beginning his time at the space agency in 2003, he has worked as a software engineer, robotics engineer, and spacecraft operator primarily focused on the robotic assembly of the International Space Station. From 2014 to 2017, he served as a space station flight director, where he led global teams in the operations and execution of the space station during all phases of flight. From 2017 to 2021, he became deputy, and then acting manager, of the ISS Vehicle Office, where he was responsible for sustaining engineering, logistics, and hardware program management. In 2021, he was assigned to NASA Headquarters as an assistant deputy associate administrator for ESDMD, where he was an integral part of the team that returned a spacecraft designed to carry humans to the Moon during the Artemis I mission."
"Kshatriya holds a bachelor of science in mathematics from the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California, and a master of arts in mathematics from The University of Texas at Austin. He was born in Brookfield, Wisconsin, but considers Katy, Texas, to be his hometown. He and his wife are the proud parents of three children, and he is also the proud son of first-generation Indian immigrants to the United States."
"Decorated with the NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal for actions as the lead flight director for the 50th expedition to the space station, Kshatriya also is the recipient of a Silver Snoopy, an award astronauts bestow for outstanding performance contributing to flight safety, for his actions as lead robotics officer for the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services Dragon demonstration mission to the orbiting laboratory."
Acting Astrophysics Division Director
"Shawn Domagal-Goldman is the Acting Astrophysics Division Director at NASA HQ. Formerly he was the Deputy Director of the Sciences and Exploration Directorate (SED) at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, an organization that leads science teams for space missions and conducts world-class research across the space sciences disciplines. One of the missions he works on is the Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO), a flagship-class space telescope concept that will tell the story of life in the universe by studying how the universe led to potentially habitable worlds, identifying habitable worlds beyond our solar system, and searching those worlds for signs of life. Shawn’s research background is as an astrobiologist that has been a member of multiple interdisciplinary teams that conduct research on the standards of evidence for biosignatures and assessment of exoplanet habitability. He does that from a systems perspective, applying cross-disciplinary lessons he learned as an Earth scientist by training, as a planetary science at NASA, and on teams studying a variety of astrophysics mission concepts. This includes serving as a Science and Technology Definition Team member for the Habitable Exoplanets Observatory (HabEx) and as the Deputy Study Scientist for the Large UV-Optical-Infrared Surveyor (LUVOIR), the two concepts that led to a decadal survey recommendation to prioritize HWO.'
(Nothing about his personal life, interesting.
This is the one individual involved
in NASA's live event today
that I have the most doubts about.
(for a variety of reasons,
one of which is
there is nothing about his personal life
on his NASA bio shown above.)
So I'll be watching closely what he has to say.
Associate Administrator (AA),
NASA Science Mission Directorate (SMD)
- NASA Headquarters
"As the Associate Administrator (AA) for the Science Mission Directorate, Dr. Nicola Fox directs ~100 NASA missions to explore the secrets of the universe–missions that use the view from space to assess questions as practical as hurricane formation, as enticing as the prospect of lunar resources, as amazing as behavior in weightlessness, and as profound as the origin of the universe. As the AA, Dr. Fox creates a balanced portfolio of carefully chosen missions and research goals to enable a deep scientific understanding of Earth, other planets, the Sun, and the universe. These efforts lay the intellectual foundation for the robotic and human expeditions of the future, while meeting today’s needs for scientific information to address national concerns."
"Dr. Fox joined NASA in 2018 as SMD’s Director of the Heliophysics Division, where she led a world-class team in understanding Earth’s most important and life-sustaining star. She oversaw NASA’s work to study key space phenomena and improve situational awareness of the very space our astronauts, satellites, and robotic missions travel through as they explore the solar system and beyond. Her portfolio also included NASA’s robust space weather research to help the U.S. government better predict space weather, which can interfere with radio communications, affect GPS accuracy, and even–when extreme–affect electrical grids on the ground."
"Dr. Fox has authored numerous scientific articles and papers, in addition to delivering science presentations worldwide. She is known for her keen ability to make science accessible to a broad range of audiences, as well as her stellar leadership, creating a sense of purpose and belonging in her teams. In 2021 she was awarded the American Astronautical Society’s Carl Sagan Memorial Award for her demonstrated leadership in the field of heliophysics. In 2020 she was awarded NASA’s Outstanding Leadership Medal. In 2024, she received an honorary Doctorate of Science from the University of Hertfordshire and an honorary fellowship of the Royal Astronomical Society."
"Prior to August 2018, Dr. Fox worked at the Applied Physics Lab at the Johns Hopkins University, where she was the chief scientist for heliophysics, as well as the project scientist for NASA’s Parker Solar Probe–humanity’s first mission to a star. Dr. Fox’s extensive project, program, and supervisory experience included serving as the Deputy Project Scientist for the Van Allen Probes and the operations scientist for the International Solar Terrestrial Physics program."
"Dr. Fox graduated from The Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine in London with a B.S. in Physics. She received an M.S. in Telematics and Satellite Communications from the University of Surrey. She then returned to Imperial College to complete a Ph.D. in Space and Atmospheric Physics."
(The link given above goes on to talk about
and share pictures of her family etc.)
That leaves one of the four
without any personal information
on his Bio on the NASA website:
and he just happens to be:
Acting Astrophysics Division Director.
I already find it
interesting what he might have to say
as compared to the others.
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