{"id":212661,"date":"2025-05-08T02:43:10","date_gmt":"2025-05-07T16:43:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nasa.gov\/?p=860705"},"modified":"2025-05-08T02:43:10","modified_gmt":"2025-05-07T16:43:10","slug":"dave-gallagher-named-11th-director-of-jpl-as-laurie-leshin-steps-down","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/?p=212661","title":{"rendered":"Dave Gallagher Named 11th Director of JPL as Laurie Leshin Steps Down"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Dave<\/a><\/figure>
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Dave Gallagher will become the director of NASA\u2019s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California on Monday, June 2. <\/div>\n
NASA\/JPL-Caltech<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Laurie Leshin has decided to step down as director of NASA\u2019s Jet Propulsion Laboratory on Sunday, June 1. David Gallagher, who has been serving as the Lab\u2019s associate director for Strategic Integration, has been selected by Caltech to lead the federally funded research and development center. Caltech manages JPL for NASA.<\/p>\n

A distinguished geochemist, Leshin was named by Caltech<\/a> to lead the lab in early 2022. Her career has spanned academia and senior positions at NASA. Several NASA missions managed by JPL have launched under her leadership, including EMIT<\/a>, SWOT<\/a>, Psyche<\/a>, PREFIRE<\/a>, Europa Clipper<\/a>, and SPHEREx<\/a>, with the NASA-Indian Earth satellite NISAR<\/a> set for a June launch. In addition, JPL has advanced the development of NASA\u2019s asteroid-hunting NEO Surveyor<\/a> mission as well as the trio of CADRE<\/a> lunar rovers, and it delivered the Coronagraph Instrument, a technology demonstration with NASA\u2019s forthcoming Roman Space Telescope<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am proud of the many things JPL has accomplished over the past three years,\u201d said Leshin. \u201cIn addition to the long list of missions that have launched or moved toward launch during that time, we saved Voyager<\/a> more than once and flew into history on Mars with Ingenuity<\/a>. We have made more amazing scientific discoveries than I can name, including finding potential ancient Martian biomarkers with Perseverance<\/a>. And we\u2019ve driven the forefront of technology on Earth and in space. I know those achievements will continue under Dave\u2019s capable leadership.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leshin, who has also served as Caltech vice president, is stepping down for personal reasons and will remain a Bren Professor of Geochemistry and Planetary Science at Caltech.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile we respect Laurie\u2019s decision to step away from her leadership position at JPL, we will miss her drive, compassion, and dedication,\u201d Caltech President Thomas Rosenbaum said. \u201cAt the same time, we are grateful to Dave Gallagher for his devotion to JPL and his continuing leadership and partnership going forward. Dave\u2019s experience working across multiple government and private sector entities will help secure ongoing support for America\u2019s agenda in space, with JPL continuing to play an essential role.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gallagher will draw on his deep experience at JPL to lead the lab into the future. He arrived at JPL 36 years ago, in 1989, and went on to hold numerous leadership positions. Along with having served as the director and deputy director for Astronomy, Physics, and Space Technology, he was manager of JPL\u2019s Advanced Optical Systems Program Office. An electrical engineer, Gallagher also managed the Spitzer Space Telescope and, among other roles, led the team that built and tested the Wide Field\/Planetary Camera 2 (WF\/PC-2) \u2014 a critical instrument that corrected the spherical aberration on NASA\u2019s Hubble Space Telescope.<\/p>\n

\u201cLaurie has made a significant impact on energizing and focusing the lab, guiding it back on track after the Covid-19 pandemic. I wish her great success in this next chapter of her career, and I look forward to a very smooth transition at the lab,\u201d said Gallagher. \u201cWe have exciting opportunities ahead helping to advance our nation\u2019s space agenda and a fantastic team to help realize them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Founded by Caltech faculty and students in 1936, JPL has been managed by Caltech on behalf of NASA since 1958.<\/p>\n

News Media Contacts<\/strong><\/p>\n

Matthew Segal \/ Veronica McGregor
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-8307 \/ 818-354-9452
matthew.j.segal@jpl.nasa.gov<\/a> \/ veronica.c.mcgregor@jpl.nasa.gov<\/a><\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Laurie Leshin has decided to step down as director of NASA\u2019s Jet Propulsion Laboratory on Sunday, June 1. David Gallagher, who has been serving as the Lab\u2019s associate director for Strategic Integration, has been selected by Caltech to lead the federally funded research and development center. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. A distinguished geochemist, Leshin [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":1,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15607],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-212661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-jet-propulsion-laboratory"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=212661"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":212708,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212661\/revisions\/212708"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=212661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=212661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=212661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}