Who Is Nicola Fox, Who NASA Has Chosen As Its New Head Of Science

Nicola Fox, NASA's new Science Mission Directorate. (photo: dock. NASA)

JAKARTA - The American National Space Agency (NASA) has just chosen Nicola Fox as the new associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate. Fox will work to oversee more than 100 important missions and projects.

"As director of our Heliophysics Division, Nicky plays an important role in expanding the impact and awareness of NASA's solar exploration mission and I look forward to working with him as he brings his talent, expertise and passion to his new role," said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, quoted from NASA's official website, Monday, March 27.

Fox will replace Sandra Connelly, who has long served at NASA's Science Mission Directorate since 2020. Fox's appointment was announced by NASA on 27 February.

"We are all grateful for the interim leadership of Sandra Connelly, who has done an extraordinary job of keeping the mission going over the past few months," Nelson said.

Now, Fox will be responsible for a $7 billion portfolio equivalent to Rp106 trillion from the Science Mission Directorate project.

The portfolio covers more than 100 missions, covering a wide range of scientific areas, ranging from investigations into how storms formed on Earth to searches for alien life to the best way to support future astronauts living on the Moon.

Fox's work at NASA is quite encouraging, no doubt the agency chose him. Fox started his career there in 2018 by leading the Hellophysics Division.

He oversaw NASA's efforts to study the Sun and how the winds on the star continued to affect Earth and other planets.

Previously, Fox worked at Johns Hopkins University' Applied Physics Laboratory, as chief scientist for Hepatitis and project scientist for NASA Parker Solar Probe.

Throughout his career, Fox has written many scientific articles and papers, in addition to delivering science presentations around the world.

In 2021, he was awarded the Carl Sagan Memorial Award of the American Astronautical Society for his leadership as shown in the field of heliophysics with extensive project, program and surveillance experience.

Lastly, Fox is also NASA's Extraordinary Leadership Medal recipient, which will be awarded in 2020.