Lead Experts

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Dr. Ghassem R. Asrar has four decades of scientific and technical experience spanning service in the U.S. government, international and non-profit organizations, and academe. He served as Vice President for science programs at Universities Space Research Association (USRA), the Director of the Joint Global Change Research Institute of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory located at the University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland, and the Director of World Climate Research Program (WCRP) in Geneva, Switzerland. During his tenure in U.S. Government, he served as the Deputy Administrator for Natural Resources and Agricultural Systems with Agricultural Research Service (ARS), of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and several senior leadership position with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). 

In 1998, Dr. Asrar was named Associate Administrator for Earth Science at NASA, subsequent to serving as chief scientist for the Earth Observing System program. During his tenure, NASA achieved successful launches of more than 20 Earth-observing research and operational environmental satellites. He also guided the development of a comprehensive data and information system to manage a record amount of unique data and information resulting from these satellites that served several million users each year. He established the NASA Earth System Science graduate fellowship and New Investigators Program to support education and training of the next generation of scientists, engineers, and technology experts. 

Dr. Asrar is a Fellow of the American Association for Advancement of Science; American Geophysical Union; the American Meteorological Society; and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Among his many awards and honors are the U.S. Presidential Distinguished Senior Executive Service Award; the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Space Systems Award; the American Geophysical Union Ambassador Award; and the American Meteorological Society Cleveland Abbey Award. He is the recipient NASA Exceptional Performance Award; NASA Exceptional Service Medal; and NASA Distinguished Leadership Medal.  In 2019, he was conferred an honorary doctoral degree by the University of Zurich in Switzerland. Dr. Asrar earned his Ph.D. in Environmental Physics from Michigan State University (MSU) and awarded Distinguished and Outstanding Alumni status. He has authored more than 220 peer-reviewed scientific and technical papers and books, primarily in the fields of biosphere and atmosphere studies and remote sensing of Earth system, with h-index of 57, i10-index of 108 and more than 19900 citations of his publications.

Dr. Azita Valinia is a senior aerospace executive, strategist, and interdisciplinary scientist with over two decades of experience spanning positions at the National Research Council, University of Maryland, NASA Headquarters, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, and NASA Langley Research Center. She is the recipient of NASA’s Outstanding Leadership Medal, and NASA’s Silver Snoopy Award for her outstanding contributions related to human space flight safety. She is certified by the NASA Federal Acquisition Certification for Program/Project Managers at the senior expert level. She served as chair of multiple NASA Standing Review Boards and holds a patent in standardized SmallSat platforms. While serving as Chief Scientist of the NASA Engineering and Safety Center (NESC), she led several technical interdisciplinary assessments for the Agency developing strategies and recommendations designed to help enable NASA’s Moon to Mars objectives, while ensuring safe human expeditions beyond low Earth orbit. She served as the Deputy Director of the NASA Office of JPL Management and Oversight at the Agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) where she led oversight of NASA’s largest contract, the Caltech/JPL Federally Funded Research & Development Center (FFRDC) on behalf of NASA Headquarters. Earlier in her career, she served as the Deputy Director of the Astrophysics Flight Projects Division at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), overseeing a portfolio of over 20 space science flight missions in operation including the Hubble Space Telescope. As the Associate Director for R&D at the Sciences and Exploration Directorate at GSFC, she led the strategic development and implementation of the organization’s science and technology development portfolio as well as future advanced mission concept formulations. She led the technical assessment teams that laid out NASA’s decadal Earth science technology investment strategy (in 2006 and 2016). Both strategies informed the deliberations and recommendations of the National Academy of Sciences “Earth science decadal surveys committees” (in 2007 and 2017). Together with the engineering directorate leadership at GSFC, she created two high-impact interdisciplinary programs, the Science-Engineering Collaboration Program, and the Research Engineering Program, fostering strong collaborations between the science and engineering directorates at GSFC. She has authored over 60 articles in technical journals encompassing topics in astrophysics, Earth, and planetary sciences as well as mission concept formulation, technology development, engineering management, and human space flight.