PIA17587-MarsCuriosityRover-MurrayButtes-20131113

Bruce Churchill Murray (November 30, 1931 – August 29, 2013) was an American planetary scientist. He was a director of the

Jet Propulsion Laboratory The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is a federally funded research and development center and NASA field center in the City of La Cañada Flintridge, California, United States. Founded in the 1930s by Caltech researchers, JPL is owned by NASA ...

(JPL) and co-founder of The Planetary Society.

Education and early life

Murray received his Ph.D. in

geology Geology () is a branch of natural science concerned with Earth and other astronomical objects, the features or rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology significantly overlaps all other Ea ...

from

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a Private university, private Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern t ...

(MIT) in 1955 and joined

Standard Oil of California Standard may refer to: Symbols * Colours, standards and guidons, kinds of military signs * Standard (emblem), a type of a large symbol or emblem used for identification Norms, conventions or requirements * Standard (metrology), an object th ...

as a

geologist A geologist is a scientist who studies the solid, liquid, and gaseous matter that constitutes Earth and other terrestrial planets, as well as the processes that shape them. Geologists usually study geology, earth science, or geophysics, alt ...

. He served in the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army S ...

as a geophysicist, and the U.S. Civil Service before joining

California Institute of Technology The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech or CIT)The university itself only spells its short form as "Caltech"; the institution considers other spellings such a"Cal Tech" and "CalTech" incorrect. The institute is also occasional ...

(Caltech) in 1960.

Main career

At Caltech, Murray became an associate professor in 1963, a full professor in 1969, and a professor emeritus in 2001. He would later become professor emeritus of

planetary science Planetary science (or more rarely, planetology) is the scientific study of planets (including Earth), celestial bodies (such as moons, asteroids, comets) and planetary systems (in particular those of the Solar System) and the processes of the ...

and

. Murray began working at the

(managed by/affiliated with Caltech) in 1960, and served as its director from April 1, 1976, to June 30, 1982. He was an important force in promoting the recruitment and hiring of female engineers at the lab, where more women are employed today than any other NASA facility. Murray became JPL's director at a time when space exploration budgets were shrinking; among other achievements, he saved the Galileo mission to

Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but slightly less than one-thousandt ...

from the budget axe. Murray worked out the geologic history of

Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Roman god of war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a thin atmos ...

using

photograph A photograph (also known as a photo, image, or picture) is an image created by light falling on a photosensitive surface, usually photographic film or an electronic image sensor, such as a CCD or a CMOS chip. Most photographs are now creat ...

s taken by Mariner 4 in 1965; he worked with Bob Leighton to accomplish this task. He applied similar photographic analysis when he served as chief scientist of Mariner 10. As he took over management of JPL, he expressed reservations about the Viking lander program, pointing out that the biological experiments included with the spacecraft were not sufficient to accomplish their stated goals. In 1971, he participated in a symposium on the occasion of the arrival of

Mariner 9 Mariner 9 (Mariner Mars '71 / Mariner-I) was a robotic spacecraft that contributed greatly to the exploration of Mars and was part of the NASA Mariner program. Mariner 9 was launched toward Mars on May 30, 1971 from LC-36B at Cape Canaveral Ai ...

, together with

Ray Bradbury Ray Douglas Bradbury (; August 22, 1920June 5, 2012) was an American author and screenwriter. One of the most celebrated 20th-century American writers, he worked in a variety of modes, including fantasy, science fiction, horror, mystery fictio ...

;

Arthur C. Clarke Sir Arthur Charles Clarke (16 December 191719 March 2008) was an English science-fiction writer, science writer, futurist, inventor, undersea explorer, and television series host. He co-wrote the screenplay for the 1968 film '' 2001: A Spac ...

;

Carl Sagan Carl Edward Sagan (; ; November 9, 1934December 20, 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is research on ...

and Walter Sullivan. Their discussions were recorded in the book

Mars and the Mind of Man ''Mars and the Mind of Man'' is a non-fiction book chronicling a public symposium at the California Institute of Technology on November 12, 1971. The panel consisted of five luminaries of science, literature, and journalism: Ray Bradbury; Arthur ...

. With

and Louis Friedman, Murray founded The Planetary Society in 1980. He also served a term as its chair.

Personal life and death

Murray was twice married. With his first wife, Joan O'Brien, he had three children. Murray and O'Brien divorced in 1970. In 1971, Murray married Suzanne Murray, with whom he had two children. One of Murray's cousins is former

Speaker of the House The speaker of a deliberative assembly, especially a legislative body, is its presiding officer, or the chair. The title was first used in 1377 in England. Usage The title was first recorded in 1377 to describe the role of Thomas de Hunger ...

Tom Foley. Murray died at his home in Oceanside, California on August 29, 2013, from complications of Alzheimer's disease, aged 81.

Awards and honors

Murray was the recipient of the 1997 Carl Sagan Memorial Award. In 2004, Murray was awarded the ''Telluride Tech Festival Award of Technology'' in

Telluride, Colorado Telluride is the county seat and most populous town of San Miguel County in the southwestern portion of the U.S. state of Colorado. The town is a former silver mining camp on the San Miguel River in the western San Juan Mountains. The firs ...

. Asteroid

4957 Brucemurray 4957 Brucemurray, provisional designation , is a stony asteroid, classified as near-Earth object of the Amor group and as Mars-crosser, approximately 3 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered by American astronomer Eleanor Helin at the Palomar ...

is named after him, and the asteroid

2392 Jonathan Murray 39 may refer to: * 39 (number), the natural number following 38 and preceding 40 * one of the years: ** 39 BC ** AD 39 ** 1939 ** 2039 * ''39'' (album), a 2000 studio album by Mikuni Shimokawa * "'39", a 1975 song by Queen * "Thirty Nine", a son ...

is named after his son. On November 13, 2013, NASA announced the names of two features on Mars important to two active

Mars exploration rovers NASA's Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission was a robotic space mission involving two Mars rovers, '' Spirit'' and '' Opportunity'', exploring the planet Mars. It began in 2003 with the launch of the two rovers to explore the Martian surface ...

in honor of Murray: "Murray Ridge", an uplifted crater that the ''Opportunity'' rover was exploring; and "Murray Buttes", an entryway the ''Curiosity'' rover had to traverse on its way to Mount Sharp.

References

External links

*
JPL HistoryMurray's homepage
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Murray, Bruce Churchill 1931 births 2013 deaths American geologists California Institute of Technology faculty Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni Planetary scientists Presidents of The Planetary Society Deaths from Alzheimer's disease Deaths from dementia in California Scientists from New York City