Mercedes Herreras Martinez

Education: Arizona State University, master’s degree in aerospace engineering
Hometown: Barcelona, Spain
What inspired you to join NASA? Since a very early age, I was very fascinated with the universe and outer space. I had so many questions: What’s out there? Are we alone? Why do we exist? I really wanted to be part of helping get answers to those questions – and NASA is doing exactly that.
Favorite beverage, food, or fuel: Monkfish and sweet potato oven fries.

Mercedes Herreras Martinez is a space systems engineer at NASA's Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley. She joined Ames after engineering internships at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where she helped design a CubeSat and contributed to the development of a magnetometer for studying Jupiter's moon Europa. A polyglot, Mercedes speaks Catalán, Spanish, and English fluently in addition to knowing French and Russian. As a college athlete, she was a regional champion in the 800-meter dash in track and field, and now enjoys a variety of sports from soccer to tennis to spearfishing. And she loves her motorcycle!