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By NASA
The innovative team of engineers and scientists from NASA, the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, and more than 40 other partner organizations across the country that created the Parker Solar Probe mission has been awarded the 2024 Robert J. Collier Trophy by the National Aeronautic Association (NAA). This annual award recognizes the most exceptional achievement in aeronautics and astronautics in America with respect to improving the performance, efficiency, and safety of air or space vehicles in the previous year.
“Congratulations to the entire Parker Solar Probe team for this well-earned recognition,” said NASA acting Administrator Janet Petro. “This mission’s trailblazing research is rewriting the textbooks on solar science by going to a place no human-made object has ever been and advancing NASA’s efforts to better understand our solar system and the Sun’s influence, with lasting benefits for us all. As the first to touch the Sun and fastest human-made object ever built, Parker Solar Probe is a testament to human ingenuity and discovery.”
An artist’s concept of NASA’s Parker Solar Probe. NASA On Dec. 24, 2024, Parker Solar Probe made its closest approach to the Sun, passing deep within the Sun’s corona, just 3.8 million miles above the Sun’s surface and at a top speed of close to 430,000 mph, ushering in a new era of scientific discovery and space exploration.
“This award is a recognition of the unrelenting dedication and hard work of the Parker Solar Probe team. I am so proud of this team and honored to have been a part of it,” said Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters in Washington. “By studying the Sun closer than ever before, we continue to advance our understanding of not only our closest star, but also stars across our universe. Parker Solar Probe’s historic close approaches to the Sun are a testament to the incredible engineering that made this record-breaking journey possible.”
Three novel aerospace technology advancements were critical to enabling this record performance: The first is the Thermal Protection System, or heat shield, that protects the spacecraft and is built to withstand brutal temperatures as high as 2,500 degrees Fahrenheit. The Thermal Protection System allows Parker’s electronics and instruments to operate close to room temperature.
Additional Parker innovations included first-of-their-kind actively cooled solar arrays that protect themselves from overexposure to intense solar energy while powering the spacecraft, and a fully autonomous spacecraft system that can manage its own flight behavior, orientation, and configuration for months at a time. Parker has relied upon all of these vital technologies every day since its launch almost seven years ago, in August 2018.
“I am thrilled for the Parker Solar Probe team on receiving this well-deserved award,” said Joe Westlake, director of the Heliophysics Division at NASA Headquarters. “The new information about the Sun made available through this mission will improve our ability to prepare for space weather events across the solar system, as well as better understand the very star that makes life possible for us on Earth.”
Parker’s close-up observations of solar events, such as coronal mass ejections and solar particle events, are critical to advancing our understanding of the science of our Sun and the phenomena that drive high-energy space weather events that pose risks to satellites, air travel, astronauts, and even power grids on Earth. Understanding the fundamental physics behind events which drive space weather will enable more reliable predictions and lower astronaut exposure to hazardous radiation during future deep space missions to the Moon and Mars.
“This amazing team brought to life an incredibly difficult space science mission that had been studied, and determined to be impossible, for more than 60 years. They did so by solving numerous long-standing technology challenges and dramatically advancing our nation’s spaceflight capabilities,” said APL Director Ralph Semmel. “The Collier Trophy is well-earned recognition for this phenomenal group of innovators from NASA, APL, and our industry and research partners from across the nation.”
First awarded in 1911, the Robert J. Collier Trophy winner is selected by a group of aviation leaders chosen by the NAA. The Collier Trophy is housed in the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum in Washington.
“Traveling three times closer to the Sun and seven times faster than any spacecraft before, Parker’s technology innovations enabled humanity to reach inside the Sun’s atmosphere for the first time,” said Bobby Braun, head of APL’s Space Exploration Sector. “We are all immensely proud that the Parker Solar Probe team will join a long legacy of prestigious aerospace endeavors that redefined technology and changed history.”
“The Parker Solar Probe team’s achievement in earning the 2024 Collier is a shining example of determination, genius, and teamwork,” said NAA President and CEO Amy Spowart. “It’s a distinct honor for the NAA to acknowledge and celebrate the remarkable team that turned the impossible into reality.”
Parker Solar Probe was developed as part of NASA’s Living With a Star program to explore aspects of the Sun-Earth system that directly affect life and society. The Living With a Star program is managed by the agency’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Applied Physics Laboratory designed, built, and operates the spacecraft and manages the mission for NASA.
By Geoff Brown
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory
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Last Updated Mar 25, 2025 Editor Sarah Frazier Contact Abbey Interrante abbey.a.interrante@nasa.gov Location Goddard Space Flight Center Related Terms
Heliophysics Goddard Space Flight Center Heliophysics Division Parker Solar Probe (PSP) The Sun Explore More
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Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
Researcher Ann Raiho measures sunlight interacting with yellow Coreopsis gigantea flowers during field work in the Jack and Laura Dangermond Preserve in California’s Santa Barbara County in 2022.NASA/Yoseline Angel For many plant species, flowering is biologically synced with the seasons. Scientists are clocking blooms to understand our ever-changing planet.
NASA research is revealing there’s more to flowers than meets the human eye. A recent analysis of wildflowers in California shows how aircraft- and space-based instruments can use color to track seasonal flower cycles. The results suggest a potential new tool for farmers and natural-resource managers who rely on flowering plants.
In their study, the scientists surveyed thousands of acres of nature preserve using a technology built by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. The instrument — an imaging spectrometer — mapped the landscape in hundreds of wavelengths of light, capturing flowers as they blossomed and aged over the course of months.
It was the first time the instrument had been deployed to track vegetation steadily through the growing season, making this a “first-of-a-kind study,” said David Schimel, a research scientist at JPL.
In this illustration, an imaging spectrometer aboard a research plane measures sunlight reflecting off California coastal scrub. In the data cube below, the top panel shows the true-color view of the area. Lower panels depict the spectral fingerprint for every point in the image, capturing the visible range of light (blue, green, and red wavelengths) to the near-infrared (NIR) and beyond. Spatial resolution is around 16 feet (5 meters).NASA For many plant species from crops to cacti, flowering is timed to seasonal swings in temperature, daylight, and precipitation. Scientists are taking a closer look at the relationship between plant life and seasons — known as vegetation phenology — to understand how rising temperatures and changing rainfall patterns may be impacting ecosystems.
Typically, wildflower surveys rely on boots-on-the-ground observations and tools such as time-lapse photography. But these approaches cannot capture broader changes that may be happening in different ecosystems around the globe, said lead author Yoseline Angel, a scientist at the University of Maryland-College Park and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.
“One challenge is that compared to leaves or other parts of a plant, flowers can be pretty ephemeral,” she said. “They may last only a few weeks.”
To track blooms on a large scale, Angel and other NASA scientists are looking to one of the signature qualities of flowers: color.
NASA’s AVIRIS sensors have been used to study wildfires, World Trade Center wreckage, and critical minerals, among numerous airborne missions over the years. AVIRIS-3 is seen here on a field campaign in Panama, where it helped analyze vegetation in many wavelengths of light not visible to human eyes.NASA/Shawn Serbin Mapping Native Shrubs
Flower pigments fall into three major groups: carotenoids and betalains (associated with yellow, orange, and red colors), and anthocyanins (responsible for many deep reds, violets, and blues). The different chemical structures of the pigments reflect and absorb light in unique patterns.
Spectrometers allow scientists to analyze the patterns and catalog plant species by their chemical “fingerprint.” As all molecules reflect and absorb a unique pattern of light, spectrometers can identify a wide range of biological substances, minerals, and gases.
Handheld devices are used to analyze samples in the field or lab. To survey moons and planets, including Earth, NASA has developed increasingly powerful imaging spectrometers over the past 45 years.
One such instrument is called AVIRIS-NG (short for Airborne Visible/InfraRed Imaging Spectrometer-Next Generation), which was built by JPL to fly on aircraft. In 2022 it was used in a large ecology field campaign to survey vegetation in the Jack and Laura Dangermond Preserve and the Sedgwick Reserve, both in Santa Barbara County. Among the plants observed were two native shrub species — Coreopsis gigantea and Artemisia californica — from February to June.
The scientists developed a method to tease out the spectral fingerprint of the flowers from other landscape features that crowded their image pixels. In fact, they were able to capture 97% of the subtle spectral differences among flowers, leaves, and background cover (soil and shadows) and identify different flowering stages with 80% certainty.
Predicting Superblooms
The results open the door to more air- and space-based studies of flowering plants, which represent about 90% of all plant species on land. One of the ultimate goals, Angel said, would be to support farmers and natural resource managers who depend on these species along with insects and other pollinators in their midst. Fruit, nuts, many medicines, and cotton are a few of the commodities produced from flowering plants.
Angel is working with new data collected by AVIRIS’ sister spectrometer that orbits on the International Space Station. Called EMIT (Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation), it was designed to map minerals around Earth’s arid regions. Combining its data with other environmental observations could help scientists study superblooms, a phenomenon where vast patches of desert flowers bloom after heavy rains.
One of the delights of researching flowers, Angel said, is the enthusiasm from citizen scientists. “I have social media alerts on my phone,” she added, noting one way she stays on top of wildflower activity around the world.
The wildflower study was supported as part of the Surface Biology and Geology High-Frequency Time Series (SHIFT) campaign. An airborne and field research effort, SHIFT was jointly led by the Nature Conservancy, the University of California, Santa Barbara, and JPL. Caltech, in Pasadena, manages JPL for NASA.
The AVIRIS instrument was originally developed through funding from NASA’s Earth Science Technology Office.
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Andrew Wang / Jane J. Lee
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
626-379-6874 / 818-354-0307
andrew.wang@jpl.nasa.gov / jane.j.lee@jpl.nasa.gov
Written by Sally Younger
2025-041
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Last Updated Mar 24, 2025 Related Terms
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Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth remarked on the value of the Air Force and Space Force in both deterring and engaging in future military conflicts while speaking at the Department of the Air Force Summit.
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Department of Defense specified that exemptions for the DoD-wide hiring freeze may be provided only for mission-critical positions that contribute to our warfighting readiness.
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Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
NASA / Maria Werries The ARMD 2024 Associate Administrator Awards were presented to NASA employees, contractors, and students or interns who distinguished themselves, either individually or as part of a group, through their overall approach to their work and through results they achieved during the award year.
LEGEND: ARMD NASA CENTERS
ARC = Ames Research Center
AFRC = Armstrong Flight Research Center
GRC = Glenn Research Center
HQ = Headquarters
LaRC = Langley Research Center
Technology and Innovation
Honoree (Individual)
Kenneth R. Lyons, ARC
Kenneth R. Lyons made significant contributions this past year that were successfully applied in advancing NASA’s state-of-the-art unsteady Pressure Sensitive Paint (uPSP) experimental measurement in NASA’s wind tunnels. Lyons was key to the development of innovative data processing capabilities such as custom software drivers necessary to transfer the high-speed uPSP data from NASA’s wind tunnels to its High-End Computer facility – as well as other data management and methodologies overall. The uPSP development team’s principal investigator referred to his work on replacing older legacy systems as a “masterpiece.”
Honoree (Group)
NASA GRX-810 Licensing Team
NASA’s GRX-810 Licensing Team demonstrated exemplary performance by developing a technologically significant new material, meeting community demands for rapid evaluation, and enabling broad industry availability through timely commercialization. The team’s efforts led to successful licensing to multiple parties, pioneering a novel approach for NASA by using co-exclusive licenses, and the negotiation of four co-exclusive licenses with commercial partners. This license structure will increase competition within the marketplace and provide incentive for each company to fast-track product development.
Team Lead: Dr. Timothy M. Smith, GRC
View Group Honorees
Honorable Mention
Shishir Pandya, ARC
Shishir Pandya’s exemplary actions as the formulation and technical lead for the Propulsion/Airframe Integration (PAI) emerging technical challenge were instrumental in creating an actionable project plan that will examine complex aerodynamic interactions between sustainable propulsor technologies – such as open rotor concepts envisioned in programs like General Electric’s Revolutionary Innovation for Sustainable Engines (RISE). Pandya was instrumental in classifying the current PAI analysis capabilities at NASA, and scoping NASA’s, GE’s, and Boeing’s roles and responsibilities for open fan integration studies, both computational and experimental.
Honorable Mention (Group)
Electric Vertical Takeoff and Landing (eVTOL) Propulsion Team
The Revolutionary Vertical Lift and Technology project’s Electric Propulsion Team achieved major accomplishments – successfully completing a technical challenge to improve propulsion system component reliability by demonstrating significant improvements in 100-kilowatt electric motors. Through an integrated interdisciplinary approach including external partner collaborations, the team produced six major technological capabilities towards further development of NASA’s Advanced Air Mobility mission.
Team Lead: Mark Valco, GRC
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Honorable Mention (Group)
Self-Aligned Focusing Schlieren Team
The Self-Aligned Focusing Schlieren Team developed a highly innovative and impactful Schlieren system that revolutionizes high-speed flow visualization in aeronautics research by enabling the use of a highly efficient, non-intrusive optical measurement technique in physically constrained environments. This new approach drastically improves efficiency in accurately capturing and analyzing complex, high-speed airflows around advanced aerospace vehicles in a non-intrusive manner – providing precise visualization without requiring the cumbersome alignment procedures of traditional Schlieren systems.
Team Lead: Brett Bathel, LaRC
View Honorable Mention Group Honorees
Leadership and Management Excellence
Honoree
Anthony Nerone, GRC
Anthony Nerone demonstrated strong leadership in formulating and leading the implementation of the Hybrid Thermally Efficient Core project. He has successfully set up a framework to establish a high-performing project team that has been an example for other Aeronautics projects. Nerone’s strong project management has led industry to accelerate the development of advanced engine technologies which have started to see infusion into products – continuing United States leadership in sustainable aviation.
Program and Mission Support
Honoree
Diana Fitzgerald, LaRC (Booz Allen Hamilton)
Diana Fitzgerald has demonstrated innovation, responsiveness, and impact in her contributions to the Transformational Tools and Technologies (TTT) project. Her creative and comprehensive approach to enhancing TTT’s communication processes has significantly improved the efficiency and effectiveness of the project’s operations, enabling ARMD to advance critical strategic capabilities and partnerships. Her dedication has garnered widespread recognition from colleagues and leadership and has had a substantial and measurable impact.
Honoree (Group)
Airspace Operations Safety Program (AOSP) Resource Analyst Group
The AOSP Resource Analyst Group worked tirelessly to skillfully review and analyze the NASA Aeronautics budget – preparing programs and projects for planning, budget, and execution inputs. Their extraordinary performance in numerous AOSP activities building, tracking, and executing milestones resulted in a smooth and transparent execution of the program’s annual budget. The group has gone beyond the call of duty and their hard work and dedication is reflected in their discipline and commitment to NASA through critical, time-sensitive attention to detail and solution-focused problem solving.
Team Leads: Michele Dodson, HQ and Jeffrey Farlin, HQ
View Group Honorees
Honorable Mention (Individual)
Shannon Eichorn, GRC
Shannon Eichorn developed and authored a compelling, creative vision for the future of aeronautics research and of NASA’s working environment. She envisioned and described a future in which NASA’s aeronautics research goals, future technologies, workforce, and capabilities are in synergy to maximize research quality and impact. Eichorn presented this vision to numerous leaders and groups at NASA, and the excitement in the room at each presentation led to engaging follow-on discussions and several workstream groups requested Eichorn to present to their full group. Her efforts inspire not only ARMD, but the entire agency.
High Potentials
Honoree
Matthew Webster, LaRC
Matthew Webster has had significant impact and contributions to meeting goals in the Convergent Aeronautics Solutions and Transformational Tools and Technologies projects. In his short time at NASA, he has rapidly demonstrated exceptional ability to adapt and apply technical expertise across multiple NASA projects to advance towards project technical goals. Webster has shown his leadership ability, providing exceptional skills at creating a healthy team environment enabling the group to successfully meet project goals.
Honorable Mention
Dahlia Pham, ARC
Dhalia Pham’s contributions as a system analyst, researcher, and teammate in support of NASA’s efforts in electrified aircraft propulsion have shown an ability to creatively solve problems, analyze impacts, present results with strong communication skills, and collaborate with and mentor others. Her technical acumen and leadership ability raise the bar, making her an established leader amongst her peers.
Strategic Partnerships
Honoree
Salvatore Buccellato, LaRC
Salvatore Buccellato identified collaborative opportunities in hypersonics research that were mutually beneficial to NASA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and other non-NASA entities through his program management experience and knowledge of NASA people and capabilities. Buccellato was able to leverage NASA and non-NASA expertise and capabilities, along with DARPA funding, to further mature and advance hypersonic technologies via ground and flight tests with the goal of enabling operational flight systems. His exemplary work helped to significantly advanced hypersonic technologies and its workforce, and are expected to lead to further partnered activities for NASA.
Pushing the Envelope
Honoree (Group)
Advanced Power Electronics Team, GRC
The Advanced Power Electronics Team of the Advanced Air Transport Technology project completed an ambitious design of a prototype flight-packaged, altitude-capable electric motor drive for aviation. Their work pushed past the state of the art in flight motor drives in several areas including power density, efficiency, and power quality – and is a steppingstone towards megawatt-level, cryogenically cooled motor drives. The electric motor design underwent many successful tests and exercises, and the team’s subsequent publications and expertise help the electrified aircraft industry push past several barriers.
Team Leads: Matthew G. Granger, GRC
View Group Honorees
2024 AA Award Honorees PDF
ARMD Associate Administrator Award
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Last Updated Mar 06, 2025 EditorLillian GipsonContactJim Bankejim.banke@nasa.gov Related Terms
Associate Administrator Awards View the full article
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