David B. Gallagher has been named project manager of Deep Space 3, a NASA mission that will be the first ever to try flying multiple spacecraft in precision formation to test a powerful astronomical observing technique called optical interferometry.
Gallagher previously served as project manager of JPL's Pressure Modulator Infrared Radiometer instrument, part of the science payload onboard NASA's Mars '98 orbiter, scheduled for launch in December. Since joining JPL in 1989, he has managed the Drop Physics Module project flown on the Space Shuttle and served as integration and test manager for the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 aboard the Hubble Space Telescope.
Deep Space 3 is part of the New Millennium Program, a flagship NASA venture whose goal is the testing of revolutionary technologies in space flight so that they may be used with confidence in space missions of the future. Set to launch in early 2002, Deep Space 3 will demonstrate precision formation flying by multiple spacecraft and long-baseline optical interferometry. Together, these will link together widely separated optical telescopes so they work as if they were a single instrument with extraordinarily sharp resolving power.
Deep Space 3 will enable science applications of optical interferometry and other spacecraft formations in the decades to come. It will pave the way for future missions of NASA's Origins Program, including the Space Interferometry Mission and Terrestrial Planet Finder, whose respective goals are to detect planets orbiting other stars and to determine whether any of those newfound planets might harbor life.
Gallagher, who earned a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering in 1982 from Purdue University, served as a design engineer for the IBM Corporation upon graduation and subsequently headed his own consulting firm for five years. Originally from Maryland, he, wife Katherine, and their three children live in La Canada, California.
JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology.
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