WASHINGTON — Retirements and reassignments have led to a leadership shakeup in part of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate.
At a January 12 meeting of three astrophysics committees during the 245th At a meeting of the American Astronomical Society, Mark Clampin, director of NASA’s Astrophysics Division, announced that he now serves as acting deputy associate administrator for the Science Directorate. He replaces Sandra Connelly, who NASA said planned to retire at the end of the year.
Clampin said he accepted the one-year assignment to support the Science Mission Directorate during the transition to the new Trump administration. “They’re very intense and require a lot of work,” he said of these transitions, recalling his experience in a previous role as science director at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. “I thought the opportunity to help (NASA Associate Administrator for Science) Nicky Fox during this period was something that would contribute overall to the science being conducted by NASA.”
Shawn Domagal-Goldman, deputy director of Goddard’s Science and Exploration Directorate, will replace Clampin as NASA’s director of astrophysics for this one-year period. He noted at the same meeting that he is on “day to seven” of his position, which he will officially take office next week.
He acknowledged that he and other leaders in the astrophysics division were facing “uncertainty and change” amid the presidential transition. “All levels of management, from these to the top of the federal government, are going to experience changes in one way or another over the next month, as well as a lot of uncertainty.”
The change in NASA’s astrophysics division comes days after a similar change in its Planetary Sciences Division, or PSD. In a Jan. 9 community letter, Fox announced that the agency had hired Louise Prockter as interim director of the Planetary Sciences Division, effective this spring. Prockter served as the chief scientist for the space exploration sector at the Applied Physics Laboratory and was previously director of the Lunar and Planetary Institute.
Leadership of the planetary sciences division has been in flux since last May, when longtime director Lori Glaze took what was expected to be a six-month stint as acting deputy associate administrator in the Planetary Sciences Division. NASA Exploration Systems Development Missions (ESDMD). However, in November, NASA announced that Glaze would permanently remain in this position within ESDMD.
During this time, Gina DiBraccio, deputy director of the Heliophysics Division at Goddard, served as interim director of planetary sciences. Fox said in a public meeting at the American Geophysical Union’s annual meeting in December that DiBraccio’s details could not be expanded and that she had returned to Goddard. In addition, Eric Ianson, deputy director of the planetary sciences division, announced his retirement at the end of the year.
This meant that Charles Webb, who had just been hired to succeed Ianson as deputy director of planetary sciences, was almost immediately named acting division director. Fox told City Hall that Webb would be acting director for a “short period of time” before bringing in someone for a year.
“Louise’s deep background in planetary science and organizational leadership uniquely qualifies her for this critical leadership position,” Fox wrote in the letter. “There are many major challenges in the PSD that require a highly experienced leader to manage, including the future direction of Mars Sample Return, ensuring Dragonfly is ready for launch in 2028, and confirming NASA’s contribution to the Mars rover mission ESA’s Rosalind Franklin.
Fox, in the letter to the community, confirmed comments made at the previous town hall that the agency would hold a competition to find a permanent division director.