Staffing

David S. Leckrone

Malcolm B. Niedner, Jr.

Randy A. Kimble

Kenneth G. Carpenter

David A. Cottingham

Barry Kirkham

David S. Leckrone
Senior Scientist, Hubble Space Telescope Project
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Code 440
Greenbelt, MD 20771
301-286-5975

Biography and Research:

Dr. David S. Leckrone is a career NASA scientist, having worked at the Goddard Space Flight Center since 1969. He holds a B.S. degree in physics from Purdue University, M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in astronomy from the University of California at Los Angeles, and an M.A.S. degree in management from the Johns Hopkins University. He is a veteran space astronomer, specializing in the ultraviolet spectroscopy of hot stars and the abundances of the chemical elements. He has been a frequent observer with space instruments, including the Orbiting Astronomical Observatory the Copernicus satellite (OAO-2), the International Ultraviolet Explorer (IUE) and the Goddard High Resolution Spectrograph (GHRS) on the Hubble Space Telescope. He leads an international team of astrophysicists and atomic physicists mapping the abundances of the elements in chemically peculiar stars with the HST/GHRS and is the author of approximately 70 scientific publications.

Dr. Leckrone has worked on the Hubble Space Telescope Project since 1976, first as Scientific Instruments Project Scientist, then as Deputy Senior Project Scientist. In 1992 he was appointed Senior Project Scientist for HST. In this capacity he provides scientific leadership for all aspects of the Hubble Project, including management, operations, development of flight instruments and on-orbit servicing. He was the Lead Project Scientist at JSC Mission Control during the highly successful Hubble servicing missions in 1993 and 1997.

Leckrone was awarded NASA's Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal in 1992 and the NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal in 1994. In May 1996, he received an honorary Doctor of Philosophy degree in mathematics and natural sciences from the University of Lund in Sweden.

Malcolm B. Niedner, Jr.
Deputy Senior Scientist, Hubble Space Telescope Project
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Code 681
Greenbelt, MD 20771
301-286-5821

Biography and Research:

Education: A.B., Physics, Brown University, 1971. MA, Astronomy, Indiana University, 1976. Ph.D., Astronomy, Indiana University, 1979.

Current Position: Astrophysicist, Laboratory for Astronomy and Solar Physics (since 2/80) Deputy Senior Project Scientist, Hubble Space Telescope (since 2/93) Former positions/titles: Discipline Specialist of Large-Scale Phenomena, International Halley Watch (1982-90) Guest Investigator, Astro-Halley (1983-86) Comet Scientist, ICE mission to Comet G-Z (1984-1985) Past research interests and the subjects of various refereed publications include cometary plasma tails, their interactions with the solar wind, and the inference of solar-wind & interplanetary magnetic field conditions out of the ecliptic plane by using comets as natural probes. Currently Dr. Niedner is shifting his focus to the high-redshift Universe: intergalactic absorption, UV background radiation, young galaxies, etc.

Kenneth G. Carpenter

Biography and Research:

Dr. Kenneth Carpenter is currently the Project Scientist for Hubble Space Telescope Operations and Ground Systems and splits his time between those duties and scientific research. Previously, Dr. Carpenter was a Co-Investigator on the Goddard High Resolution Spectrograph (GHRS) Investigation Definition Team. He received his Ph.D. from Ohio State University in 1983, worked for several years at JILA/University of Colorado, as a Postdoctoral Research Associate, then as a Research Scientist for the GHRS Project at CASA/University of Colorado and NASA/GSFC.

In 1988 he joined NASA, and several years later assumed his current duties within the HST Project. His research interests include studies of the chromospheres, transition regions, winds and circumstellar shells of cool stars, as well as the calculation of model atmospheres and synthetic spectra and investigations of line fluorescence processes. Hardware interests include development and operations of UV spectroscopic instruments, such as the GHRS and STIS.

Randy A. Kimble
Project Scientist, Hubble Space Telescope Project
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Code 681
Greenbelt, MD 20771
301-286-5783

Biography and Research:

Dr. Randy A. Kimble is Project Scientist for the Hubble Space Telescope Development Project (formerly, the Flight Systems and Servicing Project). He received his B.S. in physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and then his M.A. and Ph.D., also in physics, from the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Kimble then spent some years on the research staff of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at The Johns Hopkins University, where he was Deputy Project Scientist for the Hopkins Ultraviolet Telescope during its development and flight on the Astro-1 space shuttle mission.

Kimble's research interests are in astronomical instrumentation, particularly detectors, as well as in evolved stellar populations and the interstellar medium.

David A. Cottingham
Principal Scientist, Hubble Space Telescope Project
Global Science and Technology, Inc.
7855 Walker Drive, Suite 200
Greenbelt, MD 20770
301-286-0872

Biography and Research:

Dr. David A. Cottingham is an astrophysicist specializing in instrument design and experimental cosmology. He earned his B.S. and M.S. degrees in physics from Yale University, and his Ph.D. in physics from Princeton University. He subsequently worked at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of California at Berkeley on various experiments related to the cosmic microwave background.

Barry Kirkham
Senior Engineer, Hubble Space Telescope Project
Northrop Grumman Corp.
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Code 440.8
Greenbelt, MD 20771
301-286-6936

Biography and Research:

Dr. Barry Kirkham supports the Project Science Office primarily on the operations side of HST. He has worked on HST since the early planning days, including the design and development of the original TRW-provided ground software used at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI). He earned his Ph.D. at University College London at the University of London, in 1975. His thesis work was in experimental UV interstellar spectroscopy, especially in absorption lines of magnesium. He later worked on design and laboratory measurements for a solar Lyman-alpha coronagraph at Harvard College Observatory.