Program Mentors

Robyn Gatens

Director, International Space Station, NASA HQ

Ms. Robyn Gatens is the director of the International Space Station (ISS) in the Human Exploration and Operations mission directorate at NASA Headquarters. She is also an agency senior expert for environmental control and life support (ECLSS) and crew health and performance systems.

As ISS director, Gatens leads strategy, policy, integration, and stakeholder engagement for the space station program at the agency level, including use of the station for research and technology demonstrations including to support NASA’s Artemis missions, and activities to secure an ongoing U.S. presence in low-Earth orbit (LEO) by enabling a successful, long-term private sector commercial LEO space economy.  She also serves as NASA’s liaison to the ISS National Laboratory.

Gatens is the recipient of NASA’s Outstanding Leadership and Exceptional Achievement Medals and holds a Bachelor of Chemical Engineering degree from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Mary Cleave

bio coming soon

Barbara Morgan

Bio coming soon

Sheridan Moore, Ph.D.

Esri, Senior Technical Consultant 

Sheridan Moore is a Remote Sensing Scientist focused on hyper- and multispectral visible and near-infrared imagery with over 10 years of experience. She started her career working at NASA GSFC and has built up an expertise in the space-science realm.

Sheridan is currently a Senior Technical Consultant at Esri, the global market leader in geographic information system (GIS) software, location intelligence, and mapping. Her day-to-day consists of providing technical solutions (through ArcGIS software and a python Application Programming Interface), writing proposals, and working with customers to provide the best user-experience.

Valerie Wiesner, Ph.D.

NASA Langley Research Center

Dr. Valerie Wiesner is a Senior Research Materials Engineer in the Advanced Materials and Processing Branch at NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC) in Hampton, Virginia. She recently served as Acting Assistant Branch Head for the Crew Systems and Aviation Operations Branch at LaRC in 2022. Her research focuses on developing and understanding degradation of ceramic coatings and composites for extreme environment applications ranging from reusable hypersonic vehicles to lunar and planetary exploration and surface operations, as well as on ceramic processing and additive manufacturing.

Prior to joining LaRC in 2019, she began her NASA career as a Research Materials Engineer in the Ceramic and Polymer Composites Branch at NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) in Cleveland, Ohio, in 2014 after completing a Pathways Internship as a Ph.D. student. She served as lead investigator for evaluating damage of environmental barrier coatings designed to protect ceramic matrix composite components caused by particulates, such as sand and volcanic ash, when ingested by aircraft engines.