Squyres New NAC Chair

Steve Squyres, a highly respected planetary scientist, will be the new chair of the NASA Advisory Council (NAC).

NASA announced his appointment today. NAC provides advice to the NASA Administrator on programs and issues affecting the agency. It has a number of committees, subcommittees, and analysis groups.

Squyres is probably best known as the “father” of the two Mars rovers, Spirit and Opportunity. A professor at Cornell University, he also chaired the recent Decadal Survey on planetary science for the National Research Council. He recently took part as an “aquanaut” in the NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) simulation of a mission to an asteroid, which had to be terminated prematurely because of Hurricane Rina.