Contact: Gabrielle Birchak-Birkman
Larry Simmons has been appointed as the deputy director of
the Space and Earth Science Programs Directorate at NASA’s Jet
Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
As deputy director, Simmons will join in the directorate’s
responsibilities for all of the Laboratory’s initial space
flight project activities, except for missions to Mars. In
addition, he will share in the responsibilities for all
programmatic science activity, all flight instruments made at JPL
and for NASA’s Earth Science Enterprise flight missions.
“I have a personal interest in seeing our science program
strengthened,” said Simmons. “I’d also like to see us continue to
find ways to implement more low-cost missions in the future. High
return for low cost is certainly something we try to do here.”
Simmons received his bachelor’s degree in physics from the
University of California, Los Angeles. He has been providing his
managerial expertise at JPL since 1969 on the Atmospheric Trace
Molecule Spectroscopy Experiment, the Astrophysics and
Microgravity Flight Experiments Office and the Wide
Field/Planetary Camera II on the Hubble Space Telescope. In
addition, Simmons continues as program manager for the Space
Infrared Telescope Facility, the space-borne low-temperature
telescope due for launch in 2001. He also recently served as
manager of the Astrophysics Flight Projects Office.
Married for 40 years, Simmons and his wife, Brenda, have
been residents of La Canada since 1969. They have two children
and three grandchildren.
JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology
in Pasadena.
