Who is Nicola Fox? NASA Announces Solar Physicist As Agency's Science Chief

NASA has announced that it has selected a longtime solar scientist, Nicola Fox, who heads the heliophysics division, as the new science chief. Nicola Fox is a former top scientist on the Parker Solar Probe mission that was studying the sun. Fox was declared NASA’s associate administrator for the US space agency’s science mission directorate on Monday.

A memo by NASA Chief Bill Nelson to the employees of the space agency was first reported by Reuters. Nelson appreciated Fox’s past work on missions to understand the sun and how solar wind affects satellites and planets.

Nelson further explained how she has been instrumental in making this complex area accessible to the public. He added that her contributions already span several important areas of the agency.

Who is Nicola Fox?

NASA on Monday announced Fox’s appointment as the chief of the science directorate and stated that her new role begins effective immediately.

NASA’s science directorate is a unit of the agency with an annual budget of approximately $7 billion that supervises some of the agency’s best-known programs, including robotic hunts for past life on Mars and using the James Webb space telescope to explore distant galaxies.

Fox also studied the key space phenomena and supports situational awareness to protect astronauts, satellites, and robotic missions better.

Until 2018, Fox was working at the Applied Physics Lab at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland. She has also served as the deputy project scientist for the Van Alley Probes and the operations scientist for the International Solar-Terrestrial Physics Program.

Fox is also the author of several scientific articles and papers and has also delivered science presentations across the globe. Apart from research, she is also actively involved with science education and outreach activities.

Fox, who was born in England, obtained her PhD in space and atmospheric physics from the Imperial College of Science, Technology, and Medicine in London. She had also formerly worked at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt and is also the recipient of numerous awards from the space agency for outstanding performance.

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