NASA Administrator Michael Griffin today named Christopher Scolese as the agency’s chief engineer, replacing Rex Geveden who recently was named associate administrator.
As chief engineer Scolese is responsible directly to the administrator for the overall review and technical readiness of all NASA programs. The Office of the Chief Engineer assures that the development efforts and missions operations are being planned and conducted on a sound engineering basis with proper controls and management of technical risks.
Scolese is currently the deputy director of the Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. Previously he served as deputy associate administrator in the Office of Space Science at NASA Headquarters. In that position he was responsible for the management, direction, and oversight of NASA’s space science flight program, mission studies, technology development, and overall contract management of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
Scolese’s 20 year NASA career also includes: deputy director of flight programs and projects for Earth Science, project manager for the Terra mission and the Clouds and Earth’s Radiant Energy System instrument for Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission.
Prior to joining NASA, Scolese worked in industry and government.
Scolese served in the U.S. Navy from 1978 to 1983 at the Division of Naval Reactors. He graduated from the State University of New York at Buffalo with a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering and a master’s in electrical engineering and computer science from George Washington University, Washington.
He is the recipient of several honors including the Presidential Rank Award of Meritorious Executive, Goddard Space Flight Center¿s Outstanding Leadership, two NASA Outstanding Leadership Medals, and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) National Capital Section Young Engineer/Scientist of the Year award. He is an Associate Fellow of AIAA and a member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Scolese is married and has four children.
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NASA Announces New Glenn Center Director
Washington DC (SPX) Sep 23 – NASA Administrator Michael Griffin has announced that Woodrow Whitlow Jr. will be the next director of NASA’s John H. Glenn Research Center in Cleveland. Whitlow, who has been serving as deputy director of NASA’s John F. Kennedy Space Center in Florida, succeeds Julian Earls, who is retiring at the end of the year.
The Glenn Research Center, with about 3,300 civil service and contract employees, is a key research center for aeronautical propulsion, space propulsion, space power, space communications and microgravity sciences in combustion and fluid physics.
The center consists of 24 major facilities and more than 500 specialized research facilities at a 350-acre site near Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, and the 6,400-acre Plum Brook Station in Sandusky, Ohio.
Whitlow joined the U.S. space program in 1979 as a research scientist at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va. He also has served as director of the Critical Technologies Division of the Office of Aeronautics at NASA Headquarters in Washington and as deputy director of the Aeronautics Program Group, deputy director of the Airframe Systems Program Office and chief of the Structures Division at Langley Research Center.
In addition, he has served at Glenn Research Center as director of research and technology. He became deputy director of the Kennedy Space Center in 2003.
He holds bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees in aeronautics and astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
