The Branded Child by Edward J. Van Allen

Hundreds, sometimes thousands of people may be involved in a single project. No one builds a rocket or makes a discovery in space alone. Drawing on the talents of individuals from all nationalities and cultural backgrounds, NASA is looking to acquire the best of what humanity has to offer. NASA has evolved and so has it workforce. If your image of a NASA engineer or scientist is that of a white male in a crisp white shirt with black clip-on tie and pocket protector, think again. One in every 1,000 patents issued by United States Patent and Trade Organization has gone to scientists or engineers working on NASA projects and tens of thousands of scientific studies from the agency’s missions have been published in leading journals worldwide. As NASA has extended its presence on the final frontier, they have defined new fields and expanded knowledge and technology on almost every front. Similarly, to explain the things and places it explores, NASA enlists scientists from a multitude of specialties within the fields of astronomy, biology, chemistry, geology, materials science and physics. Space science pioneer - James Van Allen, key contributor to 25 space missions.Įngineers draw the cutting edge in every capacity for NASA, from avionics to electronics, software to rocketry. The people who turn space exploration dreams into real NASA missions or projects are engineers and scientists.

It’s something else to create the technology to actually do these things. It’s one thing to think about studying Earth from above or sending robots and humans to the moon or Mars or conducting experiments in space.

The Branded Child by Edward J. Van Allen