Since New Years I have been implementing a new life/task/action organizational system recommended to me by my dear friend and colleague Chris Lewicki. It is based on the book “Getting Things Done” by David Allen. So far things have gone swimmingly. I have started to take out of my brain every last don’t-forget-this, you-promised-this, and this-still-needs-to-happen and put in into a system for organizing them and tracking them. I feel a new future of being organized awaits me and there is still another 150 pages of the book to read and implement.

Lewicki in his infinite wisdom though, also recently sent me this quote— just to keep my new found gains in perspective:

Productivity

Getting things done is not the same as making things happen.

You can…
…reply to email.
…pay the bills.
…cross off to-do’s.
…fulfill your obligation.
…repeat what you heard.
…go with the flow.
…anticipate roadblocks.
…aim for “good enough.”

Or you can…
…organize a community.
…take a risk.
…set ambitious goals.
…give more than you take.
…change perceptions.
…forge a new path.
…create possibility.
…demand excellence.

Don’t worry too much about getting things done. Make things happen.

by Gina Trapani

It reminded me of who I am. What I am here for. What really motivates me, that I am not just an email processing machine. All of these tools are only as useful as what they enable me to Make Happen.

So I am back. Ready to swing for the fences for Yuri’s Night again, ready to demand of myself, ready to take on a more demanding schedule, ready to create the possibility of being someone who touches the lives of others and moves mountains. Because we have a big future in space to enable and it’s going to take that.

What risks have you been avoiding? How could you make the biggest difference where you are? What is just a little beyond your comfort zone? If you need help, just ask. That is what I am here for. My job is to enable all of you to Make Things Happen.

Email loretta.whitesides@gmail.com and start forging a new trajectory today…

Note: The intent of this post is not to express an opinion on the path that should be taken by NASA or its future programs. It is simply an observation from someone experiencing the end of an era.

Have you ever had the feeling of grieving even before a loss?  You see it coming and know there’s nothing you can do. Your senses are heightened to every little intricacy and you want to preserve all the details before it is too late. That is the way I feel about the Space Shuttle Program. I’ve worked at the Kennedy Space Center in various areas for roughly the past eight years. That makes me practically a newbie to most of my co-workers, but it feels like a long time to me. Long enough for KSC to feel like home. It is strange and sad to think that it will all be over in a matter of months.

Many people have never experienced anything like working at KSC. The center is sprawling; it has its own gas stations, banking, barber shops, and even a US Post Office on site. People out there speak a different language. When you first start working there, it takes several months before you have any idea what everyone is talking about. They speak in acronyms and in some cases the acronyms have become the words, because hardly anyone remembers what the letters stand for. KSC is similar to a small town, where gossip travels at speeds that far exceed a launching shuttle.

With the Space Shuttle Program, there is much more to it than the end of a contract. It is the end of an era. Most of us have become accustomed to spending the better part of our waking lives there and it is coming to a close. Everything we have come to know as so familiar will be gone, never to be seen again. This will be different than leaving a typical job. When we’re gone, we can never return to the site, never visit to see how things have changed, never set foot on the property again. It is not only a loss of the program for us, but a personal loss. We will no longer see the buildings we spent so much of our lives in, working at all odd hours of the day or night, often on weekends and holidays. The orbiters & ground support equipment we shed blood, sweat, and tears over will become distant memories only to be viewed in museums behind ropes and glass. We will seldom cross paths with many of the people who have become almost like family to us; the co-workers who will be forced to leave the area to find jobs. For us, it is a tremendous loss.

Even though I feel that I am ready to move on and pursue a career in space education and outreach, I can’t help feeling a bit melancholy about the end of the program. There are so many memories, good and bad. There is so much knowledge, expertise, and familiarity. Most of it would sound silly to anyone else, but the things I will miss include long days in the test cells working on welding jobs while listening to my co-workers tell stories from the early days of the program. I’ll miss riding in convoys to deliver Orbital Maneuvering System pods after our work is complete. I will even miss driving past the Gator Lake at the end of the road where we once saw forty-eight of the giant lizards laying up on the banks- as though it was an alligator parking lot.

There are other memories as well. Memories of working on Columbia and getting to sit in the commander’s seat the summer before she was lost. Standing in the shadow of the massive Vehicle Assembly Building to view the launch. Waiting outside with binoculars ready for her to return and the horror of the silence that should have been filled with two telltale sonic booms. Attending a surreal memorial service on the Shuttle Landing Facility runway on a grey day, in a light drizzle with the missing man formation roaring overhead. Examining the wreckage, in awe of the forces that acted upon it. These are moments I’ll always remember.

Now, as we near the end, I find myself looking around a little more, noticing and trying to take everything in. I’ll miss it all: the people, the hardware, the facilities, and the wildlife. It probably seems trite, but I don’t want to forget any of it, not even the little things. Not the chip in the floor at the bottom of the stairs in the test cell that I’ve always thought looks like a dragonfly, or the sound of thrusters when I test “fire” them on the bench, or the pain of AC motor valves jabbing me in the back as I squeeze into places never designed for human occupation. Okay, maybe I could forget that last one. Heh.

Whether you are a fan of the shuttle or not, you must admit that it is iconic. It is instantly recognizable, a beautiful machine and a work of art. It is tough to come to the realization that after this year, we’ll never again see a shuttle stack rolling out to the launch pad or leaving it in a hurry atop a billowing plume. For those of us who have lived and breathed it for years, please forgive us if it makes us a little sad to see the end. To us the shuttle is so much more than the sum of its parts and we’ll truly feel the sting of losing it and the community we’ve become a part of. It is going to be very hard to say goodbye.

No $1B Budget Increase for NASA; Fate of Ares 1 Rocket Still Unclear, Space.com

"NASA will not be getting the $1 billion budget boost civil space advocates had hoped to see when President Barack Obama sends his 2011 spending proposal to Congress Feb. 1, requiring the U.S. space agency to make even tougher than expected choices about the future of its manned space program, according to sources with close ties to the administration."

White House: Don't expect big NASA announcement, Orlando Sentinel

"Despite the decision not to hold a separate unveiling of Obama's vision, senior adviser David Axelrod said the president was "committed" to NASA and that his belief in space would be revealed with the agency's 2011 budget. Axelrod would not comment, however, on whether NASA would see an increase in its 2010 budget of $18.7 billion."

Here on Earth, we’ve grown used to having the Internet available almost anytime we want it.  As of December 2009, 74% of American adults use the internet.  60% of American adults use broadband connections at home.  55% of American adults connect wirelessly through laptops or handheld devices like smartphones.

So, what about Astronauts in space?  Do they have internet?

When I posted “The First *Human* Tweet from Space” back in May 2009, some rightly pointed out that this technically wasn’t a tweet from space.  At that time, @astro_mike wrote an email that was sync’d to the ground later in the day (email is sync’d twice a day from the space).  The email was sent to PAO and a ghost writer copied/typed the “tweet” word for word on @astro_mike’s twitter account.

Although this was a big step for NASA at the time, the agency took an even bigger step forward today when Astronauts on the International Space Station received a special software upgrade that provides personal access to the Internet. Although the internet service is still limited (no pictures or big files yet), it does allow for real time updating! TJ Creamer made the first use of the new system about eight hours ago with an update to his Twitter account (@Astro_Tj), inviting questions from those of us still stuck on Earth:

“Hello Twitterverse! We r now LIVE tweeting from the International Space Station — the 1st live tweet from Space! More soon, send your ?s”

Here’s a little more information from the official NASA press release:

This personal Web access, called the Crew Support LAN, takes advantage of existing communication links to and from the station and gives astronauts the ability to browse and use the Web. The system will provide astronauts with direct private communications to enhance their quality of life during long-duration missions by helping to ease the isolation associated with life in a closed environment. During periods when the station is actively communicating with the ground using high-speed Ku-band communications, the crew will have remote access to the Internet via a ground computer. The crew will view the desktop of the ground computer using an onboard laptop and interact remotely with their keyboard touchpad.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I’m really looking forward to this new participatory era of human spaceflight.  The challenge for all of us is to think about how we can use social media everyday to create a direct, personal connection with people who don’t usually think about spaceflight and help them experience space travel as we see it!

Musk refutes report slamming safety standards, Spaceflight Now

"A commercial space pioneer and a former astronaut are answering claims by an independent advisory panel that private companies do not meet NASA human-rating standards and last year's presidential review of the space program did not adequately consider safety.

In an annual report released Friday, the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel, or ASAP, said it would be "unwise" to abandon NASA's Ares 1 rocket and turn to private companies to transport astronauts to low Earth orbit. The board said potential commercial crew transportation providers do not meet NASA safety standards for piloted vehicles."

Control Spending Now Act: Sacrificing NASA's Long-Term Effectiveness for Political Expediency, Ian Malone for NASA Watch

As the nation looks for ways to cut out-of-control spending, one senator in particular has proposed a measure that will have a negative impact on the future of manned spaceflight. Senator Russ Feingold, (D-Wis.), has proposed the Control Spending Now Act which would cause the plans to return astronauts to the moon to be delayed by some five years.

Feingold has stated that given the current fiscal crisis that it would be fiscally irresponsible to return astronauts to the moon. He has also stated that the astronauts would be endangered by what he called, "unnecessary risk." Feingold is a member of the Senate Budget Committee.

Utilizing the Augustine Commission's report as part of his rationale as well as the recent displays by the American public of their displeasure at the amount of spending that has happened in the past year; Feingold entered the act to cut the current U.S. deficit, which stands at $1.42 trillion.

Ironically, while Feingold takes issue with NASA returning to the job of exploration, he has little issue with supporting Health Care Reform. Although estimates for the current Health Care Reform Bill vary between $1 trillion, $905 and $849 billion dollars - the cost is substantial and will encompass one-sixth of the American economy. NASA's budget by comparison, at its height during the Apollo program was $35 billion. NASA's budget for the 2010 fiscal year is currently estimated at $18 billion dollars.

The estimated savings of delaying the lunar missions is some $24.7 billion. However, the real expense could actually be in delaying the lunar program. By reigning in NASA's efforts, Feingold would in fact be giving a green light for other nations to take the lead. China, Europe, Russia and India are moving ahead with their lunar ambitions despite economic concerns.

The plans of these countries appear more pragmatic than the Apollo Program, based less on prestige and science and more on the future vitality of their respective peoples. With the recent discovery of caches of water on the moon as well as the deposits of metals, minerals and other resources to be found in the lunar regolith, the moon is a tempting target for exploration and possible exploitation. Senator Feingold's attempts to delay NASA's lunar resurgence may allow these others nation's aspirations to reach fruition at the expense of his own constituents.

Has the USA hit its final frontier in human space exploration?, USA Today

"When experts try to read the tea leaves, they're not hopeful about human space exploration in the next decade. "There won't be any," says space policy expert John Logsdon of George Washington University. Instead, he and others suggest, the administration probably will continue support of the International Space Station, which hangs in low-Earth orbit and eats up money that otherwise could send astronauts to the moon, Mars or asteroids. "Clearly, NASA is at a crossroads," says science historian Michael Robinson of the University of Hartford (Conn.). "We are revisiting some questions of a century ago about what we want out of exploration as a nation as we look to space."

NASA Names New Wallops Flight Facility Director

"NASA Administrator Charles Bolden has named William Wrobel as director of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center's Wallops Flight Facility, Wallops Island, Va., and director of the center's Suborbital and Special Orbital Projects Directorate. This directorate manages the agency's sounding rockets and scientific balloon programs."

Ares I: Is it on or off? Decision probably will come soon on NASA rocket, Huntsville Times.

"The future of NASA seems to be in a tense hold - not unlike the delays that sometimes plague rocket launches - waiting for a presidential directive to set its future course. At stake is the Marshall Space Flight Center-managed Ares I rocket, a space shuttle replacement with its future in doubt and more than 1,500 jobs across the Tennessee Valley hanging in the balance."

Keith's note: Ares 1 is dead, folks. DEAD. So is the use of Orion in LEO for trips to the ISS. Use of Orion to destinations in cis-lunar space? That is still open. Ares V as currently designed is dead but there will be a heavy launch vehicle - the debate is between an inline shuttle-derived launch vehicle for crew and cargo and a sidemount shuttle-derived launch vehicle. The sidemount concept is losing favor - fast - due to crew escape concerns. Watch for a significant commercial focus such that NASA may well use a commercial provider to launch crews into space - in a vehicle that meets NASA specs - on a launch vehicle (not necessarily the same each time) that also meets NASA specs. NASA may well be about to bow out of providing human launch services - at least for LEO. Details? Watch for Charlie Bolden's speech at the 11 Feb session of FAA's AST conference. The news for MSFC is not good - and it is not necessarily good for JSC either.

Marshall Space Flight Center managers in Washington meeting about NASA launch studies, Huntsville Times

"A team of managers and engineers from Marshall Space Flight Center are in a meeting this afternoon at NASA Headquarters in Washington DC briefing key leaders on various studies that outline a variety of NASA programs, a senior space agency spokesman told The Times today. "A team from Marshall is at NASA HQ today to brief senior managers on one of many engineering studies," said Mike Cabbage, NASA spokesman. "This is an informational meeting only. Decisions on future space flight plans will be made by the president. It remains premature for anyone to speculate about these plans before the president announces his decision."

Uncertain Future for NASA's Next-Gen Ares Rocket, Space.com/Fox

"As the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama prepares to propose changes to NASA's human spaceflight program in the president's 2011 budget request to lawmakers Feb. 1, an independent NASA safety advisory panel is warning the space agency against abandoning its current plans."

Panel Warns NASA About Outsourcing Risks, Wall Street Journal

"As part of that campaign, they have challenged the safety of the start-up ventures, which are proposing to use rockets that haven't been fully tested and, in some cases, haven't yet flown. "It is the panel's position," according to the latest report, that none of the commercial ventures vying for NASA business are "currently qualified" to meet human-safety standards, "despite some claims and beliefs to the contrary."

At the Science Online 2010: Exploring Science on the Web conference in Research Triangle Park in North Carolina this past weekend, I attended a panel session of students from Stacy Baker’s Staten Island Academy Biology class. The panel, Blogging the Future — The Use of Online Media in the Next Generation of Scientists, featured eight students who covered the following topics:

• Salina – data analysis
• Mike – extremebiology.net/blog
• Ammar – http://www.ptable.com
• Melina – chemtouch iphone app
• Brooke – Waves iphone app
• Alex – The Body Pod Game
• Carl – RPG Games
• Jack – Jack’s game

We learned how students use social media tools for homework and daily interaction with classmates and friends. They’re jazzed about anything that involves their friends (interaction) or what friends/others think is cool (the buzz factor).

Their comments about Twitter:

1. Twitter is for adults.
2. What’s the point?

I agree, from their perspective. My daughters don’t use Twitter. They text and Facebook their friends. They tease me about my TWaddiction, and threaten to take my iPhone from me during holidays — TWintervention. I digress….

Here’s how I see it:

Students have an extensive social network already. A well-populated, self-contained social bubble where the latest buzz spreads like a flash fire that consumes all the oxygen. Then they move on to the next buzz. Within their bubble, facebook meets their needs quite well. But, the moment they step out of their social bubble and yearn for the bigger buzz –timely information about what’s going on in the world, job fields or project funding — they may find Twitter useful. Or more likely they’ll leap-frog to the next social media buzz to follow Twitter.

Jack presented the games he created. We were totally blown away.

I piped up from the audience, saying someone needed to hire Jack. I asked Jack if he wanted to come to NASA and be an astronaut. He looked blankly like the words NASA and astronaut meant nothing to him. Someone else from the audience answered for him, ”Why would he want to be an astronaut, when he could be a game-developer?”

BTW: Did you know that the #1 career field for college graduates is game design?

Note: I received quite the ribbing about getting shot down by Jack. Oh NASA, we have SO much work to do! But, on the bright side, Salina was thrilled to talk about NASA.

Yay, SPACE-girl power!

Two major takeaways:

1. Students look for apps to help with homework. App developers take note: student’s create your buzz for you — if the app is cool AND meets their needs.
2. Students prefer social interaction over flashy design! If their friends or other students aren’t part of the experience, they won’t engage.

I leave you with this final image (and tweet) from the conference:

Keith's note: NASA AA for Public Affairs Morrie Goodman is an old school, traditional media type. He does not like the way I report things (OK, so who does?). But he also does not like the way that the NASA Advisory Council has been incorporated and wants to get at least one member removed due to their journalism background. So ... I sent him this email:

"Hmm .... Sanjay Gupta - in Haiti as a "journalist" for CNN - ended up doing emergency neurosurgery on "a Haitian victim on a Navy aircraft carrier - in front of the cameras. CNN "journalist" Anderson Cooper grabbed some poor kid covered in blood that a mob was trying to kill - and saved his life - in front of the cameras. As a 4th estate purist, I wonder what your take would be on this?  I would guess that you'd say that Sanjay and Anderson should have just stood by and let things happen - while the cameras rolled. Journalists do not "participate" in things, right?. Nor are they human, right? How 20th century. Any response will be posted verbatim on NASAWatch."

Newsman becomes newsmaker, Nature

"There is some conflict between these correspondents' dual roles. Not intervening in a story is a central tenet in journalism, but as doctors, these individuals are compelled to attend the sick and injured when they can help. ... Even at NASAwatch Keith Cowing baits a NASA public affairs administrator who Cowing says takes a hard line on non-interventionist journalism."

Keith's note: James Cameron's "Avatar" has continued to break box office records, has won the Golden Globe Awards for "best picture" and "best director", and is now headed for the Oscars. There is clearly something that the public enjoys about "Avatar". At a time when NASA needs to re-exert its relevance to decision makers and the public, you'd think that there would be some effort to tap this interest in a movie about the wonders of extrasolar planets, astrobiology, and what may lay out there as we explore space - rendered in unparalleled detail and believability. So, how did NASA capitalize on this phenomenon? Answer: It didn't.

All I could find online at NASA.gov is this short summary of an article that was written by someone at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and this link to an interview with someone from MIT that aired on CNN. That's it.

Charlie Bolden did make reference to the movie (without using its name) in his 5 January 2010 speech to the AAS (page 3): "But what of the discoveries we cannot predict as this New Year begins? Thus far, more than 400 extra-solar planets have been discovered orbiting other stars. Last month, a super-Earth was discovered that might be an all-water world. When will someone in this audience discover a Pandora? A real Pandora like the one in James Cameron's fabulous new movie? And will such a discovery open a positive Pandora's box - forever changing the way citizens of Earth view ourselves, and our place in the cosmos? Only time - and the best science - will tell."

Other than Bolden and his speech writers, you have to wonder who at NASA is paying attention to what is going on in society - and who is supposed to be thinking about making sure that the NASA is relevant and responsive to what is happening outside the agency. People from all walks of life flock to see a movie about space exploration - a movie directed by a former member of the NASA Advisory Council - and NASA for the most part is either oblivious - or ambivalent to this immense public interest. Yet the same people at NASA get upset when the public doesn't support the agency or show interest in what it does. Go figure.

A recent poll claims to show that "50% of Americans now say the United States should cut back on space exploration given the current state of the economy". Yet Americans are flocking in droves to see this movie - about space exploration. In an overly simplistic comparison, it would seem to me that people are voting with their discretionary funds to experience space exploration that they do not think NASA is - or should be - doing with their non-discretionary tax dollars.

If NASA took the time to understand this situation they might just learn what it is they should be doing such that the public will start to support NASA the way that they support Avatar. Oh well. The President and his family saw "Avatar". He is expected to announce what he wants NASA to be doing on/around 7/8 February. Will his new "vision" for NASA pull people in to participate as has Avatar or leave them outside without a ticket?

Avatar: A Stunning New World That NASA Is Ignoring, earlier post
How Will We Travel to Avatar's Pandora?, earlier post
Pandora Could Exist, earlier post
Video: Avatar, Augmented Reality, and NASA, earlier post

The New NASA Advisory Council Meets - At Last. But Something Is Missing (2005)

"The previous NAC counted among its members James Cameron. While Cameron happens to be a rather skilled engineer in his own right, he is, foremost, an artist - and a communicator. When he spoke at NAC meetings - and other NASA events - he often sought to infuse his advice with input from the real world outside of NASA. Much of what he had to say would not be expected to come out of the mouth of a professional committee member."

Ever since I started at NASA, my colleagues and I have lamented how little information is available via our agency-wide employee directory. The information is practical– email, phone, employer, etc.– but we often remark how great it would be if we could extend that information with more detailed, timely, and even personal content. Information about who you are, what you work on, tags and skills, or side projects, would help us connect in more meaningful ways. It would let us not just find people we already know about, but search for people based on specific properties, and learn more about colleagues we are collaborating with.

Last month, spurred into action by Sunlight Labs’ Great American Hackathon, we wanted to show that transparency isn’t just something the public consumes from government, it’s something the government provides, too. After all, “the government” is just you and me, right?

The three pillars of the Open Government Directive (as discussed here previously) are transparency, participation, and collaboration. Collaboration (or lack thereof) is something that directly affects our ability to do our jobs every day.

As a result, Nick, Robbie and I are happy to announce the availability of people.openNASA. people is a new interface for finding and learning about your colleagues and collaborators at NASA. It is an extension to the x500 system currently available at people.nasa.gov. people.openNASA automatically includes all the information provided by x500, and exposes a number of additional fields which you can fill out to tell people more about yourself and your projects (all fields are optional).

We think people is cool because it builds a superset of the existing, public, NASA contact directory. Almost anyone you can find with people.nasa.gov, you can find with this new interface. Anyone with a NASA email address can edit their own profile (after validating their identity via email). You can add a bio, details and links about your main project, social media links, previous and side projects, and of course tags and skills. You can also customize your primary name, email and phone number. No more phone calls to your old office!

And finally, we’re using a service called Gravatar to pull in a profile picture associated with your NASA email address. Once you set a gravatar, not only will it show up in people, it will show up anytime you use your NASA email on a Gravatar-enabled service online to comment or post. It’s great to put a face with a name. And if you’re not comfortable with that, again, all these field are optional.

Right now you can search by name, tag, or skills, and we’ll be adding new features as you request them on our feedback page. Please try searching for yourself, and customizing your profile. We’re looking for suggestions, so let us know what you think!

As a medical student and aspiring NASA flight surgeon (the doctor caring for astronauts), I recently participated in JSC’s aerospace medicine clerkship (aka elective). I felt called to be a NASA flight surgeon ever since learning about it through the NASA Academy internship in college and was eager to finally get a taste of the flight surgeon role.

First, I get a lot of questions on this, so, some clarification on common misconceptions:
1) Medical school is 4 years long, and requires a college degree first (like graduate school). Everyone graduates from med school as a general M.D. The fourth and final year of med school is when you decide what KIND of doctor you’re going to be (i.e., pediatrician, neurologist, surgeon, psychiatrist, obstetrician/gynecologist, internal (aka general) medicine doc, family doc, emergency doc). Your fourth year is thus spent applying to and interviewing at various programs around the country for a RESIDENCY in that specialty. Residency is ~3-5yrs long and is when you TRAIN in your chosen specialty.

2) Flight surgeons are not literally surgeons. They are M.D.’s or D.O.’s who usually have done a broader residency like family med, ER, or internal med, and then do a second, shorter residency in aerospace medicine (offered by the Air Force, Navy, UTMB-Galveston, Wright State or Mayo). The term “surgeon” is an old hold-over from the military, just like the government’s Surgeon General title. Still, it sounds cool on-console.

3) Flight surgeons do not fly on-orbit with the astronauts. FORMER flight surgeons have applied to, been accepted to and flown in the astronaut corps (e.g., Mike Barratt), but once in the corps, they no longer practice medicine as a licensed professional.

The aerospace medicine clerkship is a 4-week rotation at JSC for senior medical students, set up by Wyle, one of JSC’s life sciences contractors. The clerkship not only offers an opportunity to learn about being a flight surgeon and network within the field, but is also a potential applicant pool from which Wyle may select future flight docs. Half the time is spent working on a research project with a mentor, one of the current flight surgeons. The rest is spent in lectures on space physiology, medical selection requirements for crew, close calls and accidents, toxicology, radiation, etc., and on tours of facilities such as NBL, Ellington Field, Building 9, the neurovestibular lab, and flying the Space Shuttle Motion Simulator. All these experiences culminate in final presentations and by working through a number of case scenarios, real and hypothetical, clinical and ethical, with JD Polk, current chief of Space Medicine.

Flight docs often report having “the second-best job in the agency.” In terms of mission operations, they participate in much if not all the same training as crewmembers and support three major areas: pre-flight crew selection and training, monitoring of on-orbit crew, and post-flight debrief/rehab. Some docs are also stationed with our Russian partners in supporting training, launch and landing ops in Star City and Baikonour. Flight docs assigned to a mission not only take care of the crew, but are also responsible for crew family members as a point of support and contact, especially during mission contingencies. While these docs work direct mission medical ops, other surgeons staff the JSC clinic, seeing active and retired astronauts, and still others work on research/advanced projects for the future.

Probably one of the most challenging aspects of being a flight surgeon is that you in effect must try and serve two masters—an impossible job. Not only is your patient your responsibility and you their advocate, as is good general medical practice, but your patient is a civil servant in which NASA and US taxpayers have invested millions of dollars worth of training. But most importantly, your patient is a person, colleague, and friend, with a family on the ground. Therefore, a major medical event can disrupt work timelines, jeopardize missions, cause political strain between international partners, and create incredible family stress on Earth, all at once. This places the surgeon in a critical role of often rapid decision-making, sometimes with limited information, that must be appropriately justified to management, all while trying to keep the best interests of patient, agency and family in mind. No easy task.

All told, a good day for a flight surgeon is a boring one, especially on-console. They conduct regular private medical conferences with the crew in addition to addressing any current medical concerns. Three on-orbit events in particular send a surgeon’s heart rate skyrocketing: toxic exposure, rapid cabin depressurization, and fire/smoke inhalation. The surgeon on-console works in conjunction with BME (biomedical engineer) and can consult any medical specialist necessary for medical events such as these.

Separate from ops, constant good communication between medical and engineering/science personnel is also essential during hardware design and planning in order for the crew to do their jobs safely and efficiently. Flight docs often find themselves having to justify to engineers the medical reasons for certain design or schedule modifications or why a particular piece of hardware cannot be cut from the payload manifest despite its adding weight. In an engineering-dominated center such as JSC, the physician is often an outnumbered but necessary liaison between those who design the missions and those who ARE the mission.

Historically, flight surgeons were seen as “the bad guys,” the ones who held the authority of whether or not to ground crewmembers. But conscious efforts have been made to change this stereotype, and I believe this will continue to improve with longer duration spaceflight. Already, what I witnessed during the clerkship was a much more collegial relationship designed to support NASA family, with the patient-doctor relationship remaining sacred.

I knew being a flight surgeon was the right fit for me the day I realized it is not so much the nature of NASA’s work that fuels me as it is being able to support the people with whom I work. As it turns out, as a flight surgeon, that IS your job. The ability to care for NASA family in the role of physician is a pay-it-forward type of exchange: you keep crew performing to the best of their physical and mental abilities, and they in turn are able to explore on behalf of all of us. To quote a colleague particularly enamored with this task, “it’s like taking care of Lewis and Clark.” I look forward to that privilege.

"Miles O'Brien and "This Week in Space" are back for their first show of 2010. In this episode: the space nation awaits direction from President Obama, Endeavour gets ready to deliver a room with a view, how an abandoned McDonald's is being used to restore closeups of the Moon, a space telescope finds new planets, plus an interview with Hubble-Hugger-In-Chief John Grunsfeld. You also can subscribe for free to watch episodes from iTunes."

Also featured is the return of Moon rocks and Everest rocks by Scott Parazynski to NASA for placement inside Node 3 on the ISS.

Boeing Lays Off 36 Employees at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, SpaceRef

"The Boeing Company, part of both the United Space Alliance and United Launch Alliance has laid off a total of some 36 of its employees at NASA's Kennedy Space Center. These employees run the range from general support personnel to engineers. The employees were given two month notices. Boeing has hundreds of employees that work in the shuttle program, most of whom will lose their jobs when the shuttles are mothballed. More layoffs will happen in the spring and again in the fall."

Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel Releases Annual Report

"The Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel, or ASAP, a congressionally mandated group of independent experts established after the 1967 Apollo 1 fire, has released its 2009 annual report."

ASAP Public Meeting First Quarter 2009, page 5-6: "Acknowledging that General Bolden raised an important point, Admiral Dyer commented that the ASAP would recommend almost a new communications genesis. The ASAP suggested that the new Administration and the in-bound Administrator take time to consider a new approach that would explain not only the level and range of risk associated with space exploration, but also the importance of the work, the reward that justifies the risk, and the acceptance of that risk by willing and knowledgeable astronauts. The public discourse thus would be more direct and clearer, with less interpretation required. General Bolden agreed, contending that American citizens can handle difficult issues, so NASA should quit treating them as if they are children who do not understand, instead bringing them in as partners."

Keith's note: Wow. If Bolden means to attempt to do this as Administrator, this would be quite an astonishing accomplishment i.e. treating "American citizens as partners" in what NASA does - and how it does it. Go for it Charlie.

Keith's note: Archived streaming video of suborbital scientists undergoing centrifuge training at NASTAR is now online here. Higher quality video will be posted shortly.

Environmental Tectonics Corporations The NASTAR(R) Center Commences Space Training for Prospective Scientist-Astronauts

"The Suborbital Scientist-Astronaut Training Course [Tuesday/Wednesday, 12-13 Jan] has been developed by The NASTAR Center and is organized by Dr. Alan Stern and Dr. Dan Durda of the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI). "

Keith's note: You can follow events at the workshop at OnOrbit.com/suborbital or at The pre-flight of a sub-orbital scientist (Joe Hill)

On Twitter you can follow @thenastarcenter, NASAWatch or track all Tweets via #suborbital

You can also check the Suborbital Science page at Facebook and TheNASTARCenter on YouTube

- ETC's The NASTAR(R) Center Announces Winner of Student Patch Design Contest Outreach Effort, earlier post- NASA Solicitation: Commercial Reusable Suborbital Research Program - CRuSR - Request for Information, earlier post
- List of Speakers Announced for the Next-Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference, earlier post

So maybe being 35 it might be time for me to start thinking about growing up.

I don’t mean getting stodgy or conservative or saying things like, “because we have always done it that way” but I mean giving up some of the tactics that I honed at a young age to survive the wilds of Junior High that might not be so appropriate anymore.  You see in Junior High I was picked on mercilessly by some of the guys (who my teachers assured me were only doing it because they were threatened by me- fat lot of consolation that was when I would go home crying every day). My survival strategy became to be as cool as possible. Luckily I had an older sister who through osmosis I could learn from and start to take on the ways of the cool rebel kids. I shaved the sides and back of my hair, wore dark lipstick and high top skater shoes.

It has served me well over the years. Although I took all honors and AP classes in high school, I escaped nerdom, played sports, and once I hit 9th grade never got picked on again. In college, I had fun, did what I wanted and took on my career fearlessly. I was not usually intimidated by a room full of senior engineers once I got to NASA because, hey, they were not nearly as cool as me. Heck I even created a whole space holiday around being cool.

I forgot that I had made it all up. I started to think that I was just born cool.

But recently I have begun to see the toll having to be cooler than everyone is taking. I noticed that I have had little time for those who weren’t as cool as me and that ends up being exclusionary and hurtful. Ironically probably as hurtful as those boys were to me. I realized that I am cutting out whole groups of people I could learn from and work with. So maybe its time to stop playing that game, maybe I don’t need to be “shields-up” all the time against an attack that was called off 20 years ago. Maybe it’s ok to just be normal, just one among equals, to listen and to make time for everyone- just like my dad does. I mean that would be practicing what I preach. Didn’t I say in my TEDxNASA talk that when we grow up and become a galactic civilization we will get back that connection with everyone and everything that we had when we were kids? Maybe I can do my part for the galaxy by doing my own growing up first and be the change I want to see in the Universe.