SLAS Regular Meeting
Friday, May 20, 2011
7:30pm
McDonnell Hall
Washington University

NASA's Planetary Exploration:
From Mid-Town St. Louis

by

Richard Heuermann
Washington University

Rich Heuermann will explain how St. Louis scientists play a prominent role in the exploration of our solar system. NASA's robot spacecraft and orbiting telescopes are actively exploring planets, moons, comets, and asteroids, from Mercury out to Saturn. One spacecraft is well on its way to Pluto. Images and data are beamed back to Earth to be archived in St. Louis and studied by planetary scientists from all over the world. It is here that all of the images and instrument readings for solid surfaces from all NASA missions, past and present, are stored and cataloged. It is in St. Louis, at Washington University and UM-St. Louis, that scientists are studying the origin of the Sun, Earth and the other planets; the evolution of planets and moons; the location of metal, mineral, and water resources on the Moon; indications of prehistoric water on the
surface of Mars, and other topics on the frontiers of planetary science.

Rich Heuermann is the Outreach Program Coordinator of the NASA Missouri Space
Grant Consortium at Washington University. A Webster Groves resident, he is also an amateur astronomer and long-time member of the Saint Louis Astronomical