JAYDEEP’S BIOGRAPHY

Dr. Jaydeep Mukherjee is the Director of the NASA Florida Space Grant Consortium (FSGC). It is an association of seventeen public and private Florida Universities and colleges led by the University of Central Florida. The Consortium also includes all of Florida’s community colleges, as well as the Astronaut Memorial Foundation, Space Florida, Kennedy Space Center, and Orlando Science Center. FSGC supports the expansion and diversification of Florida’s space industry, through providing grants, scholarships, and fellowships to students and educators from Florida’s public and private institutes of higher education. FSGC is a part of the National Space Grant College and Fellowship program under the NASA Office of STEM Engagement.

FSGC has sponsored experiments designed and built by school and college students that have flown to the International Space Station. College and university students, supported by FSGC, have built, and launched cubesats in orbit, and designed and built rockets. They have also designed and built payloads that have flown in sounding rockets, high altitude balloon platforms and on weather balloons. Several students are also involved in cutting edge research with FGSC funded university faculty specially on topics relevant to NASA’s Mission Directorates (Aeronautics, Science, Human Exploration and Operation and Space Technology).

Dr. Jaydeep Mukherjee received his Bachelor’s degree in Physics from St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai and Master’s degrees in Physics from Mumbai University, India, and his M.S and Ph.D degrees in Astronomy from the University of Florida. He was also the Director of the Florida Space Institute from 2006 to 2011. Currently he is serving on the Board of Directors of the National Space Grant Alliance and the National Space Grant Foundation and is on the industry advisory board for the Engineering Physics department at Embry Riddle Aeronautical University.  

In 2011 the National Education Society of India presented him with the 2011 National Eminence Award. In 2011, he was a member of the Inaugural Lunabotics Mining Competition that was presented the Group Achievement award by NASA for outstanding teamwork for the highly successful Lunabotics Competition, engaging hundreds of students and partners in science, technology, engineering and math. In 2003, he was a member of the Radio JOVE team that received the Group Achievement Award from NASA Goddard Space Flight Center for excellence in outreach. In 1993, he was also awarded the Kerrick Prize by the Astronomy Department at the University of Florida for the commitment to the education of the public and to their understanding of Astronomy.