Dr. Laurie Leshin (1966- )

Dr. Laurie Leshin, director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory from May 2022 until June 2025, is a distinguished geochemist and space scientist with extensive leadership experience in academia and government.

Under Leshin’s tenure as JPL director, several new NASA missions were launched including EMIT, SWOT, Psyche, PREFIRE, Europa Clipper, and SPHEREx, with the NASA-Indian Earth satellite NISAR prepared for launch. In addition, JPL advanced the development of NASA’s asteroid-hunting NEO Surveyor mission as well as the trio of CADRE lunar rovers, and it delivered the Coronagraph Instrument, a technology demonstration with NASA’s forthcoming Roman Space Telescope.

Leshin was the first woman to serve as JPL director, a role that also included serving as Vice President at Caltech, which manages JPL for NASA. Upon leaving JPL, Leshin continues as the Bren Professor of Geochemistry and Planetary Science at Caltech and in her role as co-investigator for two instruments on NASA's Mars Curiosity rover.

Before coming to JPL, Leshin was president of Worcester Polytechnic Institute from 2014 to 2022 and previously served as Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute School of Science dean. At NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center from 2005 to 2008, she served as director of science, then deputy director for science and technology, leading strategy, planning, and implementation of more than 50 Earth and space flight projects. In 2010, Leshin became deputy associate administrator of the Exploration Systems Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters, overseeing future human spaceflight.

Her numerous honors include NASA’s Outstanding Leadership Medal and Distinguished Public Service Medal, and the Meteoritical Society’s Nier Prize for outstanding research by a scientist under the age of 35. The International Astronomical Union named asteroid 4922 Leshin to honor her planetary science contributions. Leshin advised President George W. Bush on space policy, and Barack Obama appointed her to the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum advisory board. Leshin holds a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Arizona State University, and master’s and doctoral degrees in geochemistry from Caltech.