Arthur F. Thurnau Professor Alec D. Gallimore
DR. ALEC D. GALLIMORE is an Arthur F. Thurnau Professor and is a Professor of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan where he directs the Plasmadynamics and Electric Propulsion Laboratory. Professor Gallimore is also the Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Education in Michigan's College of Engineering. Professor Gallimore is on the faculty of the Applied Physics program at Michigan, is the director of the NASA-funded Michigan Space Grant Consortium, and is project director for the Michigan/Air Force Center of Excellence in Electric Propulsion. He received his B.S. in Aeronautical Engineering from Rensselaer, and his M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in Aerospace Engineering from Princeton. His primary research interests include electric propulsion, plasma diagnostics, space/re-entry plasma simulation, use of plasma for energy production and environmental remediation, and nano-particle physics. He has experience with a wide array of electric propulsion technologies including Hall thrusters, ion thrusters, arcjets, RF plasma sources, 100-kW-class steady MPD thrusters, and MW-level quasi-steady MPD thrusters. Professor Gallimore has implemented a variety of probe, microwave, and optical/laser plasma diagnostics. The author of some 300 journal and conference papers on electric propulsion and plasma physics, Professor Gallimore serves on the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Electric Propulsion Technical Committee and is a Fellow of AIAA. Professor Gallimore is an Associate Editor for the Journal of Propulsion and Power and for the JANNAF (propulsion) Journal, and has served on a number of advisory boards for NASA and the Department of Defense including the United States Air Force Scientific Advisor Board (AFSAB). He was awarded the Decoration for Meritorious Civilian Service in 2005 for his work on the AFSAB.

Professor Iain D. Boyd

Professor Brian Gilchrist

Professor Benjamin Longmier,    Department of Aerospace Engineering Assistant Professor
Dr. Ben Longmier is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan. He is developing the next generation of advanced thrusters from 10W to 200kW to enable wide access to remote destinations within the solar system. To enable this, his research interests center on electric propulsion, spacecraft and aerostat design, low temperature plasma physics, plasma materials interaction, and plasma diagnostics. Prior to coming to UM he served as the Principal Research Scientist at Ad Astra Rocket Company, and was responsible for developing experiment campaigns and new plasma diagnostics appropriate for high power engine and exhaust plume testing. He has served as PI and project manager for six NASA microgravity spacecraft technology development programs over the past eight years with six cumulative hours in microgravity. He earned his PhD in Engineering Physics in 2007 from the University of Wisconsin under Noah Hershkowitz, and then completed a post-doctoral fellowship with NASA and the University of Houston. In 2011, he was appointed Chair of the new American Institute for Aeronautics and Astronautics National Educator Academy-High Altitude Balloon Program to enhance student aerospace education nation-wide.

Dr. Tim Smith,    Department of Aerospace Engineering Lecturer
Tim Smith is a prior post-doctoral researcher at PEPL and presently a lecturer in the UM Aerospace Engineering department. For his dissertation research, he developed and validated a novel method for deconvolving xenon ion velocity distributions from laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) spectra, allowing unprecedented nonintrusive measurements of Hall thruster and ion engine plumes. Dr. Smith has 9 years of vacuum facility experience (with Hall thruster, ion engine, and hollow cathode tests) and 17 years of test experience with optical diagnostics for fluid dynamics, both passive (using emission spectroscopy) and active (LIF and optogalvanic spectroscopy with ring dye and extended-cavity diode lasers). Dr. Smith was the Principal Investigator on AFOSR program to design a magnetic deflector system to protect spacecraft laser communications systems from Hall thruster plume charge-exchange ions. He was also PI (in cooperation with Penn State) on a NASA effort to develop a low-intrusive fiber-optic plug for reentry vehicle TPS materials. His current research interests center around the modeling, development, and validation of advanced optical diagnostics for electric propulsion (EP) systems.

Dr. J.P. Sheehan
J. P. received his bachelor's degree in Engineering Physics in 2009 and his Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering and Engineering Physics in 2012 from the University of Wisconsin - Madison (UW). At UW he studied the plasma sheath surrounding electron emitting surfaces, particularly as applied to emissive probe measurements of the plasma potential, through both theory and experiment. Currently he is working on developing the CubeSat Ambipolar Thruster, a miniature plasma thruster for small satellites, and investigating the basic physics of plasma in converging/diverging magnetic nozzles.

Roland Florenz    
Roland Florenz received is BS in Mechanical Engineering from Cornell University in 2008, his MS in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Michigan in 2009 and his MS in Electrical Engineering in 2012 from the same. He is currently a fifth year graduate student whose primary research interest is in high-power electric propulsion and is presently designing a 200-kW Hall thruster.

Kimberly Trent,    NSF Fellow, Ford Fellow, & NASA JPFP Fellow
Kimberly Trent graduated from Yale University with a B.S. in Applied Physics and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Applied Physics at the University of Michigan. Her research interests include advanced propulsion and plasma physics. Her thesis research will focus on measuring and characterizing the time-resolved electron energy distribution functions (EEDFs) of a 600-W Hall thruster plasma to discover how low-frequency transients affect ionization and erosion. The goal of this research is to develop methods for controlling the EEDF to further increases thruster efficiency and lifetime in the low-power operating range. Time-resolved EEDF measurements will be obtained at unprecedented rates using PEPL's High-speed dual Langmuir probe system (HDLP) and upgraded data acquisition hardware. Kimberly is presently carrying out a research project to study how the EEDF of a helicon plasma changes when neutral or excited gas is injected into it.

Christopher Durot    
Chris graduated from Arizona State University in spring 2008 with degrees in physics and mathematics and then began studies in the Applied Physics program at Michigan in fall 2008. His research interests are in optical diagnostics of the plasma dynamics in Hall thrusters. He has done work on the cavity ring down spectroscopy (CRDS) and laser induced fluorescence (LIF) projects at PEPL and is currently focused on developing a time resolved LIF system at the lab.

Michael Sekerak,    NASA NSTRF Fellow
Michael J. Sekerak received his B.S. (High Honors) in Mechanical Engineering from Illinois Institute of Technology in 1999. He then pursued an M.S. in Aeronautics and an Engineer's Degree in Spacecraft and Mission Design from California Institute of Technology in 2001 and 2005, respectively. While attending Caltech he conducted research on vacuum arc thrusters with the Advanced Propulsion Technology Group at NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He was called to active duty in the U.S. Army and served 5 years as a cavalry officer including one combat tour in Iraq as well as the Missile Correlation Center in Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Station. From 2007 to 2010 he was an aerospace and propulsion engineer with the Missile Systems group at Sandia National Laboratories, where he designed and launched vehicles in support of the Missile Defense Agency and U.S. Navy. He is also currently a Major in the Air Force Reserves and teaches science and spacecraft design lessons for the Reserve National Security Space Institute. He is a third year graduate student whose primary research interests are high-speed plasma transients and instabilities in EP devices.

Scott Hall,     NSF Fellow
Scott received his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Michigan State in the spring of 2012 and joined PEPL following graduation. Scott is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan. While an undergrad he worked on research concerning composite materials as well as the motion of cracks in Antarctic ice sheets. Scott is a first year student whose research interest is high-power nested-channel Hall Thrusters.

Raymond Liang,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2013, Ph.D.

Adam Shabshelowitz,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2013, Ph.D.

Laura Spencer,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2012, Ph.D.

Michael McDonald,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2012, Ph.D.

David Huang,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2011, Ph.D.

Ricky Tang,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2011, Ph.D.

Rohit Shastry,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2010, Ph.D.

Thomas M. Liu,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2010, Ph.D.

Robert B. Lobbia,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2010, Ph.D.

Baïlo Bah Ngom,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2009, Ph.D.

Sonca V. T. Nguyen,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2009, Ph.D.

Daniel L. Brown,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2009, Ph.D.

Kristina M. Lemmer,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2009, Ph.D.

Bryan M. Reid,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2009, Ph.D.

David E. Kirtley,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2008, Ph.D.

Prashant R. Patel,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2008, Ph.D.

Jesse A. Linnell,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2007, Ph.D.

Allen L. Victor,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2006, Ph.D.

Joshua L. Rovey,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2005, Ph.D.

Daniel A. Herman,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2005, Ph.D.

Mitchell L. R. Walker,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2005, Ph.D.

Peter Y. Peterson,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2004, Ph.D.

Richard R. Hofer,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2004, Ph.D.

Brian E. Beal,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2004, Ph.D.

Tim B. Smith,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2002, Ph.D.

James M. Haas,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2001, Ph.D.

George J. Williams Jr.,    Graduated University of Michigan in 2000, Ph.D.

M. T. Domonkos,    Graduated University of Michigan in 1999, Ph.D.

Jonathan L. Van Noord,    Graduated University of Michigan in 1999, Ph.D.

Frank S. Gulczinski III,    Graduated University of Michigan in 1999, Ph.D.

Sang-Wook Kim,    Graduated University of Michigan in 1999, Ph.D.

Colleen M. Marrese,    Graduated University of Michigan in 1999, Ph.D.

Lyon B. King,    Graduated University of Michigan in 1998, Ph.D.

John E. Foster,    Graduated University of Michigan in 1996, Ph.D.

Y. Li,    September 2006 - December 2007

L. Gritter,    January 2003 - May 2005

T. Stindl,    June 2003 - November 2003

L. Talerico,    September 2002 - December 2003

D. McFarlane,    September 2002 - December 2003

L. Craig,    September 2000 - September 2001

S. Malone,    September 1997 - May 1998

N. Majumdar,    January 1996 - May 1997

M. Reichenbacher,    September 1992 - December 1994

J. Spieth,    September 1992 - December 1993

D. Rudra,    January 1992 - December 1993

C. Clauss,    September 1991 - May 1993