Martin Wen-Yu Lo is a spacecraft trajectory expert currently working at the NASA-owned

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 ...

. Martin Lo is well known for discovering the Interplanetary Superhighway, also known as the

Interplanetary Transport Network The Interplanetary Transport Network (ITN) is a collection of gravitationally determined pathways through the Solar System that require very little energy for an object to follow. The ITN makes particular use of Lagrange points as locations w ...

. The superhighway is created by combined gravitational forces of several planets that connects planets by a network of “tunnels” and is the most efficient way to navigate the solar system. This continues to be his main area of research.

Biography

Lo received his Bachelor of Science in 1975 from the

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 ...

in mathematics and his PhD, also in mathematics, in 1981 from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to ...

. He has been a research scientist in the Navigation and Mission Design Section at the JPL since 1986. In 2000, Lo, Kathleen Howell, and other scientists from the JPL developed the LTool program to calculate paths near Lagrange points (ITN paths). Compared with previous methods, LTool is capable of predicting orbits up to 50 times faster. They used this tool to calculate the trajectory for the Genesis mission (2001, NASA) trajectory, which took days rather than 8 weeks. The trajectory makes use of gravitational tugs of objects in the way of the spacecraft, ensuring minimal fuel use on the return journey. They called this trajectory the Interplanetary Superhighway. He also designed the trajectory for

SpaceDev SpaceDev, a part of the "Space Systems Business" of Sierra Nevada Corporation, is prominent for its spaceflight and microsatellite work. It designed and built components for the hybrid rocket motors for Paul Allen's Tier One suborbital SpaceS ...

's SmallTug. LTool was nominated for the Discover Innovation Award.INTERPLANETARY SUPERHIGHWAY MAKES SPACE TRAVEL SIMPLER
NASA July 17, 2002 He is the leader of the Lagrange Group, which is an interdisciplinary and international group of researchers and STEM experts from universities,

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeedi ...

centers, and industry. Their focus is on developing nonlinear astrodynamics techniques with applications to space missions and dynamical astronomy. Lo appeared in

Werner Herzog Werner Herzog (; born 5 September 1942) is a German film director, screenwriter, author, actor, and opera director, regarded as a pioneer of New German Cinema. His films often feature ambitious protagonists with impossible dreams, people with u ...

's film ''

The Wild Blue Yonder ''The Wild Blue Yonder'' is a 2005 science fiction fantasy film by German director Werner Herzog. It was presented at the 62nd Venice Film Festival, where it won the FIPRESCI Award. It was screened in competition at the Mar del Plata Interna ...

'' in 2005.

Awards and recognition

Martin was awarded the

NOGLSTP Out to Innovate, previously the National Organization of Gay and Lesbian Scientists and Technical Professionals (NOGLSTP), is a professional society for professionals in science, technology, mathematics, and engineering. Each year, Out to Innovate g ...

LGBTQ ' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity. The LGBT term is ...

Scientist of the Year in 2012. Nominated for a Discover Innovation Award by

Discover magazine ''Discover'' is an American general audience science magazine launched in October 1980 by Time Inc. It has been owned by Kalmbach Publishing since 2010. History Founding ''Discover'' was created primarily through the efforts of ''Time'' mag ...

for work on the Interplanetary Superhighway.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lo, Martin 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians American LGBT scientists Living people California Institute of Technology alumni Cornell University alumni Year of birth missing (living people)