Roman Team

technician installs a cover plate over the detectors for Roman

Management

Meet the people who are leading Roman’s development.

A selfie of a woman in a blue coat, knitted beanie, and sunglasses standing in front of an icy background. She appears to be standing on the side of a slushy, cleared road and snow-covered mountains and cloudy blue skies are behind her.

Jackie Townsend is Setting the Stage for Extraordinary Science

“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.”

A man and woman in hiking gear

Jeffrey Kruk: Helping the World See the Big Picture in the Sky

“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.”

A man standing on a ladder

David Content​ Hopes to Answer the Big Questions with Roman

“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.”

Science

Meet some of the scientists who are venturing into new territories of science with the Roman Space Telescope.

Joshua Schlieder

Joshua Schlieder: Feet on the Ground, Head in the Stars

"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."

A man stands in front of a cosmic backdrop

Ken Carpenter: Ensuring Top-Tier Science from Moon to Stars

“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.”

Engineering

Meet some of the engineers who are building the Roman Space Telescope.

Joshua Abel: Delivering Roman’s Optical Telescope Assembly On Time, On Target

Joshua Abel: Delivering Roman’s Optical Telescope Assembly On Time, On Target

"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."

Glenn Bazemore: Professional Problem-Solver

Glenn Bazemore: Professional Problem-Solver

"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."

Sanetra Bailey – The Brains Behind the Brains of the Roman Mission

Sanetra Bailey – The Brains Behind the Brains of the Roman Mission

"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."

Melissa Harris

Melissa Harris: Propelling Space Telescopes Toward Success

"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."

Greg Mosby

Gregory Mosby, Jr. connects us to faraway galaxies

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

Missie Vess

Melissa Vess: Triathlete and Roman Spacecraft Systems Engineer

"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."

A woman sits at a table

Nithin Abraham provides thermal coating expertise for NASA spacecraft

“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.”

A portrait of a woman

Alice Liu: Modeling Missions’ Jitters Before Flight

“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.”

A woman working in an engineering lab

Margaret Dominguez Helps NASA Space Telescopes Open Their ‘Eyes’ to the Universe

“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.”

A man standing

Matt Bolcar: Optical Engineer Who Helps the Upcoming Roman Space Telescope See

“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.”

A standing man

Bert Pasquale, Optical Designer of the Roman Space Telescope, Takes on Complex Problems

“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.”

Communications and Outreach

Meet the team who helps bring Roman's news and progress to the public.

Social Media Lead Courtney Lee

Social Media Lead Courtney Lee

“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."

Roman Space Telescope Technical Photographer Jolearra Tshiteya

Technical Photographer Jolearra Tshiteya

"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."

Claire Saravia Andreoli

Public Affairs Officer Claire Saravia Andreoli

"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."