Who I am - words that describe me:
Scientist (Physicist); Engineer (Communications); Public/Private Administrator.
I am primarily interested in what I do professionally, rather than who I am. (Others could well describe me differently, either because they see me from a different perspective or because we all have an infinite capacity for self delusion.)

My personal challenges:

1. In the early 1970s I was a member of a professional group at the National Academy of Sciences/Institute of Medicine. It was formed to advise the just-created Robert Wood Johnson Foundation that had aspirations to conduct a national health service delivery program.

   Coincidentally, NASA was then conducting the Skylab program.

   We noted that during their orbital stays, in the near-absence of the local force of gravity, the astronauts experienced atrophied muscles, brittle bones, and decreased cardiovascular and respiratory capacity. In time, I observed to my medical associates that these physiological characteristics are similar to those which accompany human aging, and that aging-related life sciences studies might be able to be conducted in orbit in an accelerated manner.

   I then suggested to NASA that it consider making such studies. A decade later, as the director of the Congressional Space Station study, I saw that this opportunity was mentioned in its final report. And half a dozen years later, the Sophron Foundation and the Evans Foundation brought together life scientists from our National Institute on Aging and NASA to inquire whether or not such studies should be made. They decided that they could and should be made. Plans to commence doing so began to be laid soon thereafter.

   This is a bit of history that, a quarter of a century later, introduces the matter of John Glenn returning to orbit to be engaged there on the Shuttle in aging-related life sciences research studies.

   See: "Civilian Space Stations and the U.S. Future in Space", Congress of the United States, Office of Technology Assessment, Washington, D.C., 1984; especially pages 117-118 "Medical Research of Direct Interest to the General Public."

2. During the mid-1960s I was a Deputy Director of Defense Research and Engineering in the Office of the Secretary of Defense.

   While there, if I wanted to give important instructions regarding the Defense activities for which I was responsible to those who were expected to carry them out, I found it best to do so in my office in the Pentagon.

   But if I wanted to be sure that I understood what was actually going on in the "real world" with respect to such activities, it was mandatory that I go out into the field and work along with their leaders for awhile. As a consequence, I often time visited places far from Washington, D.C., in areas of potential and actual military conflict. And I spent time on aircraft carriers and submarines in remote areas, in B-52s, etc.

   For over two years ending last March I was a co-Director of a cooperative NASA-STA study that inquired into the possibility of a potentially large "space tourism" business being created in the United States.

   One of the Recommendations of this study is that "...senior Federal officials responsible for our civil and business space interests [should] consider taking the lead in opening up space to the general public by taking trips to space themselves."

   It is in this context that, by NASA invitation, I am now planning to visit the underwater Scott Carpenter Space Analog Station -- the nearest that I shall be able to come to visiting orbit. (I became 75 years old last month.)

   See: "General Public Space Travel and Tourism -Volume I Executive Summary", the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the Space Transportation Association, NP-1998-03-11-MSFC, March, 1998; especially page 20.

My career:

1. As the president of the Space Transportation Association, I am responsible for advancing the interests of its members in identifying, supporting and promoting those initiatives within the business community and the government which assure continued U.S. leadership in providing safe, reliable and economical space transportation.

2. As the chairman of the Sophron Foundation I oversee its resources being used, under its charter, to:

   Ameliorate problems of the very young;

   Ameliorate problems of the very old; and

   Do useful things in space.

Likes/Dislikes about career:

1. Seeing important and useful changes made in the lives of individuals who otherwise would not be able to do so, and seeing larger societal changes come about that, on balance, make life somewhat more secure and livable for many; and

2. Being at the "crest of the wave", where novel and significant professional and societal changes are being made.

Future goals:
In the space domain, I have played useful roles in the early development of satellite communications, navigation and position fixing. But as a citizen of the United States, the world's greatest democracy, I continue to be disappointed that our Country is not working much harder than it is to see our general public, as well as our professional astronauts, have the opportunity to make trips into space. This should now be the unique U.S. contribution to the future of space. I am working to see this come about.

My thoughts about space exploration:
Space exploration interests me primarily because many/most of our civil space leaders want to see our people return to the Moon and emigrate to Mars. While I have an interest in seeing us do so, as I have just noted, my primary interest is that of seeing space opened up to the general public.

I am now working to advance a proposal that would see both of these ends addressed in concert: the acceptance of a novel public-private space "compact" that would see NASA extend itself to prompt the latter to happen in our private sector and thereby obtaining approval and funding for the former.