SESSION TYPE: Featured Speaker SESSION TITLE: Mapping a Path to the Solar System and Beyond STRAND: STEM DAY: Friday TIME: 2:30 - 3:30pm LOCATION: Beekman Parlor, 2nd floor

Half a century ago this year, the space age was born with the roar of a mighty rocket and the beeping of the first radio message from space. As children on that October day in 1957, many of us throughout the world were suddenly awestruck by the reality of space flight and the possibility of traveling to other worlds far beyond our own. The galvanizing effect was produced by a small object no larger than a basketball called Sputnik 1 that, in a matter of minutes, had become a new star in the heavens; a star made by humans. As a young boy in Costa Rica, I was no different from other youngsters gazing at the heavens elsewhere on our planet and, like countless others, I too cast my dreams into the starry night. In those days, the bold and timely leadership of the United States, embodied in JFK’s words still resonates: “…We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard…” Today we are doing something hard, opening a path for humanity into the new space frontier. We must work together like never before, setting aside old paradigms and dream again about what can be possible. New realities have recast that space dream from one of military superiority to one of entrepreneurship and international cooperation. The information revolution has leveled the playing field, eliminating the traditional monopolies of knowledge; today, technology transcends national frontiers. The planetary scale environmental challenge we now face also requires urgent and collective action. Space technology may provide the key to finding many of the immediate solutions that are required to protect and preserve our world today but, be it on this world or in others we may find we will be doing nothing less than insuring our own survival.

For information about how to purchase his book, please visit www.franklinchangdiaz.com

BIOGRAPHY

Dr. Franklin Chang Díaz is founder and current Chairman and CEO of Ad Astra Rocket Company, a US firm developing advanced plasma rocket technology with operations in Houston, Texas and Guanacaste, Costa Rica. In 2005 Dr. Chang Díaz completed a 25 year career as a NASA astronaut where he became a veteran of 7 space missions. He has logged over 1,600 hours in space, including 19 hours in three space walks. In 1994, in conjunction with astronaut training at NASA, he founded and directed the Advanced Space Propulsion Laboratory (ASPL) at the Johnson Space Center where he managed a multi-center research team developing advanced plasma rocket propulsion concepts. Dr. Chang Díaz is the inventor of the VASIMR engine, a high power plasma rocket currently under development by Ad Astra for in-space applications. He has over 30 years of experience in experimental plasma physics, engineering and high power electric propulsion and 25 years of experience in space operations and the management and implementation of research and development programs at NASA. Dr. Chang Díaz holds a PhD degree in Applied Plasma Physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Connecticut. Prior to his work at NASA, Dr. Chang Díaz was involved in magnetic and inertial confinement fusion research at MIT and the Charles Stark Draper Laboratory. He is an Adjunct Professor of Physics at Rice University and the University of Houston. He is married to the former Peggy Marguerite Doncaster of Alexandria, Louisiana and has four daughters: Jean Elizabeth (34) Sonia Rosa (30), Lidia Aurora (20) and Miranda Karina (12). He enjoys music, flying and scuba-diving. His mother, brothers and sisters still reside in Costa Rica.