Tracy Drain | |
|---|---|
 Official NASA profile photograph, 2008 | |
| Education | Mechanical Engineering, University of Kentucky |
| Occupation | Systems Engineer |
| Employer | NASA |
| Spouse | Ted Drain (Married 2003 - present) |
Tracy Drain is a flight systems engineer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She is the deputy chief engineer for the JUNO mission, which arrived at Jupiter in June 2016.
Tracy Drain was born in Louisville, Kentucky. [1] She was always curious about space and the formation of our solar system, and decided to study mechanical engineering in 11th Grade while at Waggener High School. [2] Drain was a big fan of Star Trek , Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica . [3] Throughout high school she competed in mathematics competitions and insisted on watching space shuttle launches on television. [4] Drain received a bachelor's degree Mechanical Engineering from University of Kentucky in 1998 and a master's degree in mechanical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2000. [5] She was the first person in her immediate family to receive a college degree. [6] Whilst studying at university, she spent two summers as an intern for NASA Langley. [7] [2] She interviewed for several aerospace companies before settling on JPL, which she chose because she felt "that their mission was my mission: the robotic exploration of space". [2]
Drain joined JPL immediately after graduating in 2000, working on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. [7] After the launch in 2005, Drain was promoted to lead systems engineer. [7] Drain joined the Kepler project in 2007 as the Missions Readiness Lead, hunting for Earth-like planets, staying until Kepler checked-out in 2009. [7] In 2009 she joined Juno, which is studying the gravity and magnetic fields of Jupiter. [1] She is Technical Group Supervisor for the Flight Systems Engineering group. [7] She has worked for NASA for more than 17 years. [6] Drain worked on the Psyche mission, studying the largest known metal asteroid in our solar system, launching in 2022. [3] [8] Drain is currently the lead flight system systems engineer for NASA's Europa Clipper mission, set to launch in 2024 to the Jupiter system to study one of Jupiter's moons. [9]
Tracy Drain is involved with a range of activities to communicate her enthusiasm for engineering with the public. [10] She is an Exchange Consultant for the National Academy of Sciences, a program that connects the entertainment industry with scientists and engineers to create accurate science in both film and TV. [11] [3] Drain was a Jury Member for the 2017 Sundance Festival. [12] She has spoken about women in film and engineering alongside Diane Kruger at the Sloan Film Summit. [13] She takes every opportunity to encourage girls and young people into STEM careers. [14] [15] [16] Drain was involved with the promotion of the 20th Century Fox movie "Hidden Figures", in a series of films entitled "Hidden Figures, Modern Figures", and took part in several panel discussions. [17] [18] [19] In 2017 Drain gave a TEDx talk at the ArtCentre College of Design, "Beauty of the Fall". [20] [21]
2007 - NASA Exceptional Achievement Medal for exceptional performance in the development of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mission's transition to Science Phase Activities [22]
2009 - NASA Exceptional Achievement Medal for exceptional achievement in guiding and managing the Kepler Launch, Commissioning and Science Operations readiness effort [23]
2015 - JPL Bruce Murray Award for exceptional support for the education of minority and female STEM students through community programs, distance learning and public events [24]
2015 - Women in Engineering ProActive Network Women in Engineering Champion Award [25]
Tracy Drain is married to fellow JPL engineer, Ted Drain. [26]
Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is a Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC) in La Cañada Flintridge, California, Crescenta Valley, United States. Founded in 1936 by Caltech researchers, the laboratory is now owned and sponsored by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and administered and managed by the California Institute of Technology.
Voyager 1 is a space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977, as part of the Voyager program to study the outer Solar System and the interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere. It was launched 16 days after its twin, Voyager 2. It communicates through the NASA Deep Space Network (DSN) to receive routine commands and to transmit data to Earth. Real-time distance and velocity data are provided by NASA and JPL. At a distance of 165.2 AU from Earth as of October 2024, it is the most distant human-made object from Earth. The probe made flybys of Jupiter, Saturn, and Saturn's largest moon, Titan. NASA had a choice of either doing a Pluto or Titan flyby; exploration of the moon took priority because it was known to have a substantial atmosphere. Voyager 1 studied the weather, magnetic fields, and rings of the two gas giants and was the first probe to provide detailed images of their moons.
Voyager 2 is a space probe launched by NASA on August 20, 1977, as a part of the Voyager program. It was launched on a trajectory towards the gas giants Jupiter and Saturn and enabled further encounters with the ice giants Uranus and Neptune. It remains the only spacecraft to have visited either of the ice giant planets, and was the third of five spacecraft to achieve Solar escape velocity, which will allow it to leave the Solar System. It has been sending scientific data to Earth for 47 years, 1 month, 24 days, making it the oldest active space probe. Launched 16 days before its twin Voyager 1, the primary mission of the spacecraft was to study the outer planets and its extended mission is to study interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere.
The Voyager program is an American scientific program that employs two interstellar probes, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. They were launched in 1977 to take advantage of a favorable alignment of the two gas giants Jupiter and Saturn and the ice giants, Uranus and Neptune, to fly near them while collecting data for transmission back to Earth. After launch, the decision was made to send Voyager 2 near Uranus and Neptune to collect data for transmission back to Earth.
Bert Gentry Lee is an American scientist, space engineer, and science fiction author. He is chief engineer for the Planetary Flight Systems Directorate at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Claudia Joan Alexander was a Canadian-born American research scientist specializing in geophysics and planetary science. She worked for the United States Geological Survey and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She was the last project manager of NASA's Galileo mission to Jupiter and until the time of her death had served as project manager and scientist of NASA's role in the European-led Rosetta mission to study Comet Churyumov–Gerasimenko.
Scott J. Bolton is an American theoretical and experimental space physicist. He is an associate vice president of the Southwest Research Institute Space Science and Engineering Division. His research area is planetary sciences with a focus on the giant planets and the origin of the solar system. Previously serving as a member of the Galileo and Cassini–Huygens missions, Bolton became the Principal Investigator of Juno, a New Frontiers program mission to Jupiter which began primary science in 2016.
Adriana C. Ocampo Uria is a Colombian planetary geologist and a Science Program Manager at NASA Headquarters. In 1970, Ocampo emigrated to California and completed her Master in Sciences at California State University, Northridge and finished her PhD at the Vrije Universiteit in the Netherlands. During high school and graduate studies she worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where she serves as the science coordinator for many planetary missions.
Dr. Mamta Patel Nagaraja is an American engineer and scientist, and currently the Associate Chief Scientist for Exploration and Applied Research. In this role, she advises NASA's chief scientist on missions where humans perform science in spaceflight. She has degrees in aerospace engineering, mechanical engineering, and biomedical engineering. Her dissertation research was in molecular biology where she studied genetic changes in bone cells exposed to simulated microgravity. She previously received two interviews to become a NASA astronaut, served on the NASA Administrator's team, led a science communications portfolio, and served on a White House Council.
Susan G. Finley, a native Californian, has been an employee of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) since January 1958, making her the longest-serving woman in NASA. Two days before Explorer 1 was launched, Finley began her career with the laboratory as a human computer, calculating rocket launch trajectories by hand. She now serves as a subsystem engineer for NASA's Deep Space Network (DSN). At JPL, she has participated in the exploration of the Moon, the Sun, all the planets, and other bodies in the Solar System.
Alejandro Miguel San Martín is an Argentine engineer of NASA and a science educator. He is best known for his work as Chief Engineer for the Guidance, Navigation, and Control system in the latest missions to Mars. His best known contribution is the Sky Crane system, of which he is coinventor, used in the Curiosity mission for the descent of the rover.
Cathy Olkin is a planetary scientist at the Southwest Research Institute, focusing on the outer Solar System. She is deputy principal investigator for NASA's Lucy mission examining the Trojan asteroids around Jupiter, which launched in 2021 and will fly past its targets between 2025 and 2033.
Powtawche N. Valerino is an American mechanical engineer at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She worked as a navigation engineer for the Cassini mission.
Zainab Nagin Cox is a spacecraft operations engineer at Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Asteroid 14061 was named "Nagincox" after her in 2015. She has received the NASA Exceptional Service Medal.
Amy Simon is an American planetary scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, involved in several missions of the Solar System Exploration Program.
Candice Joy Hansen-Koharcheck is a planetary scientist. She is responsible for the development and operation of the JunoCam, for which she received the NASA's Outstanding Public Leadership Medal in 2018.
Moogega Cooper-Stricker (born 1985) is an American astronomer, and the Lead of Planetary Protection for the Mars 2020 Mission and is involved with the InSight Mission. Dr. Cooper also takes part in programs and speaking engagements to encourage young women or and others from underrepresented communities to pursue careers in science and technology.
John R. Casani is an American engineer. He worked for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where he managed the Voyager, Galileo, Cassini and Prometheus projects.
David Y. Oh is an American spacecraft systems engineer and expert in electric propulsion. Dr. Oh currently works at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) as the NASA Psyche mission chief engineer. Prior to this role he served as the Project Systems Engineering Manager for Psyche. He was also the cross-cutting phase lead and lead flight director for the NASA Mars Science Laboratory mission and was recognized in popular media for living on Mars time with his family during the month following the landing of the Curiosity rover.
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