Professional research experience

Dates:    April 2008 to date
Place:     Planetary and Space Sciences Research Institute, UK
Position: Visiting Research Fellow
Duties:

Developing techniques and instrumentation to investigate the subsurface regolith of an asteroid in situ.
Presentation of the work at an international conference. 

Dates:     December 2007 to April 2008
Place:      Planetary and Space Sciences Research Institute, UK 
Position: Consultant
Duties:

Prototyping of a dust sensor for use on the Martian surface.
Writing a technical report summarising the work.

Dates:     August 2006 to September 2007
Place:      Finnish Meteorological Institute, Finland 
Position: Post Doctoral Research Assistant
Duties:

Research and Development of a Numerical Weather Prediction model for Mars.
Updating of software for processing data from a Mars lander.
Attending and presenting at international conferences, contributing to funding proposals.

Dates:     September 2001 to July 2006
Place:      Planetary and Space Sciences Research Institute, UK 
Position: PhD student

Development of a Penetrometer Test Rig to simulate a landing spacecraft.
Calibration and characterisation of a spacecraft penetrometer.
Thermal modelling using numerical techniques of a spacecraft penetrometer.
Prototyping of an asteroid penetrometer/thermal probe.
Attending and presenting at international conferences.

Education

Doctor of Philosophy in Planetary Science gained from The Open University (2006)

Bachelor of Science in Astrophysics with first class honours gained from the University of London (2001)

Skills

Spacecraft instruments:
Interpretation of spacecraft data (penetrometer). 
Characterisation of a spacecraft penetrometer, laboratory tests of spacecraft accelerometers.
Computer thermal modelling of a spacecraft temperature sensor.  
Prototyping of a dust sensor
Prototyping of an asteroid penetrometer
Prototyping of an asteroid thermal probe
Updating code to process data from the wind, pressure and temperature sensors of a Mars lander

Science & Technology:
 Dynamic nature of granular material investigated using penetrometers, thermal probes and computer models
 In situ measurements for understanding the formation and evolution of NEOs
 Asteroid deflection techniques
 Characterisation of the Martian atmosphere using a Numerical Weather Prediction model
 Entry, Descent and Landing Systems (EDLS) modelling using simulations and NWP models
 Virtual Prototyping of space missions
 Design of a Penetrometer Test Rig simulating the landing of a 100 kg lander in the laboratory

Technical skills:
Analysis of mechanical vibrations from laboratory apparatus using an accelerometer and mathematical modelling
Development of a Graphical User Interface for data collection using IDL and C++ 
Running NWP models and manipulating output using scripts (shell, perl) and Grads in Linux
FEMLAB and control volume techniques for thermal modelling
Population of printed circuit boards, soldering etc
Coded a 1000+ line FORTRAN program for simulating EDLSs
Knowledge of Dreamweaver for building websites
 
International collaborations and networking: 
Oral and poster presentations at various international conferences          
Three week visit to the Space Research Institute, Austria 

Other space related experience:
Solar heated hot air balloons, Mission architectures for sending humans to Mars, Entry, Descent and Landing Systems and 3D computer modelling