Today’s Tidbits: November 2, 2017

Here are our tidbits for November 2, 2017:  Trump officially sends Mike Griffin’s nomination to the Senate; Anne Kinney returns to Washington to head NSF’s Math and Physical Sciences Directorate.  Be sure to check our website for feature stories and follow us on Twitter (@SpcPlcyOnline) for more news and live tweeting of events.

Trump Formally Nominates Mike Griffin for DOD Position

Last night, President Trump formally sent his nomination of Mike Griffin to the Senate to be Principal Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics (USD/ATL).  The President announced his intent to nominate Griffin last week.  This would be an interim appointment.  Griffin is expected to become the new Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering (USD R&E) when that position comes into existence on February 1, 2018 as part of a congressionally-required reorganization of the USD/ATL office.

Griffin was NASA Administrator from 2005-2009 and worked at NASA in several previous positions as well as in industry, but he also has extensive experience in the national security space sector.  For example, he was Deputy for Technology for the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization (now the Missile Defense Agency).  He testified to the National Space Council on October 5 on the national security space panel.

Anne Kinney Moves to NSF

Anne Kinney will become the new head of the National Science Foundation’s (NSF’s) Mathematics and Physical Sciences (MPS) Directorate in the new year.   Kinney is currently Chief Scientist of the W.M. Keck Observatory in Hawai’i.  She spent many years at NASA and was Director of the Solar System Exploration Division at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center before joining Keck.

She is an expert in extragalactic astronomy and held several top positions in the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters before moving to Goddard.

At NSF, she will lead the foundation’s largest department, which supports fundamental research in astronomy, chemistry, physics, material sciences, and mathematics.  NSF Director France Cordova said in a statement that Kinney “arrives at a special moment in our quest to understand the universe — as excitement builds for a new era of multi-messenger astrophysics.”

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