James M. Russell III is an atmospheric scientist who has served as the developer of instrumentation for several NASA probes. He is currently a professor of Planetary and Atmospheric Sciences and co-director of the Center for Atmospheric research at Hampton University.
Russell received a BSEE degree from Virginia Tech in 1962. He received an MSEE degree from the University of Virginia in 1966 and a Ph.D. in Aeronomy from the University of Michigan in 1970.
In 1960 Russell and his wife Jenna joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He has served in many callings in the LDS church including Bishop, Stake President and Regional Representative.
Russell led the team that first identified the connection between chlorine and ozone gas depletion.
Russell was the lead investigator connected with a satellite to study ice in part of the Earth's atmosphere. [1]
Gerard Peter Kuiper was a Dutch astronomer, planetary scientist, selenographer, author and professor. He is the eponymous namesake of the Kuiper belt.
Henry Eyring was a Mexico-born United States theoretical chemist whose primary contribution was in the study of chemical reaction rates and intermediates.
Joseph Percival "Joe" Allen IV is a former NASA astronaut. He logged more than 3,000 hours flying time in jet aircraft.
Stephen Kern Robinson is an American former NASA astronaut.
Don Leslie Lind was an American scientist, naval officer, aviator, and NASA astronaut. He graduated from the University of Utah with an undergraduate degree in physics in 1953. Following his military service obligation, he earned a PhD in high-energy nuclear physics from the University of California, Berkeley in 1964.
The TIMED mission is dedicated to study the influences energetics and dynamics of the Sun and humans on the least explored and understood region of Earth's atmosphere – the Mesosphere and Lower Thermosphere / Ionosphere (MLTI). The mission was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on 7 December 2001 aboard a Delta II rocket launch vehicle. The project is sponsored and managed by NASA, while the spacecraft was designed and assembled by the Applied Physics Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University. The mission has been extended several times, and has now collected data over an entire solar cycle, which helps in its goal to differentiate the Sun's effects on the atmosphere from other effects. TIMED Was Launched Alongside Jason-1.
Verner Edward Suomi was a Finnish-American educator, inventor, and scientist. He is considered the father of satellite meteorology. He invented the Spin Scan Radiometer, which for many years was the instrument on the GOES weather satellites that generated the time sequences of cloud images seen on television weather shows. The Suomi NPP polar orbiting satellite, launched in 2011, was named in his honor.
The Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere is a NASA satellite originally launched to conduct a 26-month study of noctilucent clouds (NLCs). Its mission was extended, and as of 2022 is still operational. It is the ninetieth Explorer program mission and is part of the NASA-funded Small Explorer program (SMEX).
Noel Beldon Reynolds is an American political scientist and an emeritus professor of political science at Brigham Young University (BYU), where he has also served as an associate academic vice president and as director for the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies (FARMS). He was a member of the BYU faculty from 1971 to 2011. He has also written widely on the theology of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, of which he is a member.
Joanne Simpson was the first woman in the United States to receive a Ph.D. in meteorology, which she received in 1949 from the University of Chicago. Simpson received both her undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of Chicago, and did post-doctoral work at Dartmouth College. Simpson was a member of the National Academy of Engineering, and taught and researched meteorology at numerous universities as well as the federal government. Simpson contributed to many areas of the atmospheric sciences, particularly in the field of tropical meteorology. She has researched hot towers, hurricanes, the trade winds, air-sea interactions, and helped develop the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM).
The National Institute of Aerospace (NIA) is a non-profit research and graduate education institute headquartered in Hampton, Virginia, near NASA's Langley Research Center.
Timothy Laurence Killeen is a British geophysicist, space scientist, professor, and university administrator. Killeen took office as the president of the University of Illinois system in 2015. He has been the principal investigator on research projects for NASA and the National Science Foundation. Killeen has authored more than 150 publications in peer-reviewed journals as well as more than 300 other publications and papers. He has served on various White House committees and task forces and is a past editor-in-chief of the Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics.
Dorothy Jean Johnson Vaughan was an American mathematician and human computer who worked for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), and NASA, at Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. In 1949, she became acting supervisor of the West Area Computers, the first African-American woman to receive a promotion and supervise a group of staff at the center.
Mian Chin is a Chinese atmospheric chemist. She is a physical scientist in the atmospheric chemistry and dynamics laboratory in the earth science division at Goddard Space Flight Center. Her research includes aerosol-cloud-chemistry-climate interactions. She received the NASA Exceptional Achievement Medal in 2005.
Yolanda Shea is a Research Physical Scientist at NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. In 2019, Shea earned a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) for her work in pioneering shortwave spectral measurements.
Lin Chambers is an American physical scientist. She has developed and contributed to multiple international programs around science education and citizen science at NASA Langley Research Center.
Michael H. Freilich was an American oceanographer who served as director of the NASA Earth Science division from 2006–2019.
Moustafa T. Chahine was an atmospheric scientist and an international leader in atmospheric remote sensing using satellite observations. He was the Science Team Leader for the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder on NASA's Earth Observing System Aqua satellite, and the Chairman of the Global Energy and Water Exchanges (GEWEX) Science Steering Group of the World Climate Research Program (WCRP).
Demetrius Dante Venable is an American physicist and professor emeritus at Howard University in Washington, D.C. Over his career, he has specialized in optical physics, and is known for establishing and developing physics programs at multiple historically Black universities.