I earned my Ph.D. in 1995 from the University of Minnesota.

My thesis research was developing and calibrating a mass spectrometer for use in the Earth's Upper Atmosphere.  This was know as the REFLEX mass spectrometer.

This instrument was flown in January, 1996 on a sub-satellite of the space shuttle.  It was designed to study self-contanimation of spacecraft.  Basically, we were hoping to better understand how gases leave a spacecraft, undergo collisions with ambient atmospheric atoms or molecules and are reflected back to the spacecraft from which they came.  This information is important improving the design of missions in the Earth's atmosphere.

During the summer of 1998, Jason Bursack, Nathan Frank and myself analyzed the data from this mission.  More information about the about mission and the result of the analysis are available here.