“I really like talking to kids who are not straight A students because my path was not typical. But it shows that when you find something you love and apply yourself, you can do anything.”

“It is very rewarding to see all the pieces of a big project come together. As project scientist, I get to see this happen in real time.”

“Project managers have to see the big picture. I have always been a big picture guy. To me, that is the point of physics. I always want to see how what I am doing fits in the big picture.”

“[Roman] is a flagship mission and represents the pinnacle of our astrophysics missions in terms of scope and scale. The bigger the technical challenge that needs to be solved, the more exciting it is to me.”

“I was good at science and math in high school and decided to study aerospace engineering in college. People would always ask why I didn’t want to become a teacher instead. And plenty of people said, ‘Well you’re a girl, you’ll never do it,’ but I took that as a challenge.”

"I study red dwarf stars and the exoplanets that orbit them. I hope someday that the astrophysics community will detect enough planets around red dwarf stars to truly understand the population and disentangle how such small stars can form so many planets."

“My experience in Hubble’s operations and ground systems led me to get involved with the same for Roman at a very early stage. I was involved in developing the early concepts for Roman and helping it get selected as an official NASA mission.”

“The Roman team I am leading is tasked with developing a pixels-to-cosmology pipeline for the analysis of supernova data. We will develop tools to aid the community in obtaining supernova lightcurves and prism spectra, which are precise enough to be used in testing various cosmological modes.”

“I’m just thrilled when I think of what we learned from [Hubble] and how much we’ll build on it with Webb and Roman. It’s like learning to drive on a starter car and then later being able to drive a luxury car, especially if you were involved in improving the design.”

Growing up, Rob was inspired by images and descriptions of cosmic phenomena. “It’s come full circle, and now I get to give back and maybe help inspire another generation of kids to get interested in astronomy.”

"My goal is to deliver the assembly to the Roman observatory on time, within budget, and meeting all the technical requirements. I lead a small team of subject matter experts to review the vendor’s plans and help resolve any technical issues."

"On Roman, I helped with a subsystem inside its Wide Field Instrument (WFI) called the simplified Relative Calibration System (sRCS). This sub-system will be used to help scientists accurately measure light output from cosmic entities like galaxies and stars."

"I am currently working on part of the telescope’s avionics subsystem as a Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) Developer for the Multi-Channel Analog Card. This subsystem is like the brains of the spacecraft, driven by software to provide commands and controls."

"I look forward to what I do every day, and I know it is going to have an impact way beyond my comprehension. The part I have in the Roman mission is going to get that telescope to where it needs to be and discover some amazing things."

"It’s exciting to work on developing new ways to solve problems whether it includes borrowing techniques from statistics, physics, or applied math."

"I look at the big picture of a mission on the engineering side. I am responsible for overseeing all the different subsystems that make up the spacecraft, making sure that all the puzzle pieces fit together."

“Growing up, I did not know that I wanted to be an engineer. Now, I provide technical expertise on spacecraft thermal control coatings in support of satellites, instruments, and telescopes for NASA missions.”

“I started as a project analyst. Over time, I became the lead analyst, the product development lead, the guidance and navigation controls systems engineer, the pointing system lead and now the integrated modeling lead for a NASA flagship mission, Roman.”

“I was always curious and had a lot of questions and thought that physics helped me answer some of these questions. Now, we are building the grism, a slitless spectrograph, which will measure galaxy redshifts to study dark energy.”

“I am a systems engineer in optics, making sure that all the pieces of the optical system work with each other and with the rest of the system, such as the thermal and mechanical systems.”

“My art informs my engineering, my engineering informs my art. The beauty of technical design and the technicality of my photographic style go hand-in-hand. Who I am is both encompassed by, and also reflected in, both.”

“It motivates me to support a great purpose, pioneer technology for spaceflight, and to conquer the challenges that inevitably occur along the way.”

“I wanted to create a game because right now, a lot of what we [at NASA] make is geared toward people who already know science…But there are huge audiences out there who, like me, didn't realize that they could love or be intrigued with NASA because it was never where they were."

"I believe you always end up where you need to be and that everybody can make things happen for themselves. They just have to be creative in how they think and how they approach situations. You belong wherever you think you belong."

"I work with scientists and help them craft the stories they want to share. Science, and astrophysics in particular, is fascinating but can deal with concepts that are difficult to grasp, let alone explain."

“When it comes to outreach, you can have an interaction that will help shape a kid’s future, or open a person’s eyes to the importance of space exploration. I try to be very conscious about how I am presenting NASA and these missions to the public.”

“Photography plays a crucial role during every phase of a project’s life cycle at NASA. Ultimately our images serve as visual record of what it takes to put a spacecraft into orbit.”

“I always want to showcase science in a way that helps people really understand what’s going on. I try to make sure the narration and visuals both teach.”