Professor Don Gurnett on the Voyager Missions

The Rational View podcast with Dr. Al Scott

In this episode I’m continuing in a bit of a ‘space science’ theme to interview Professor Emeritus Don Gurnett, the Primary Investigator on the plasma wave instruments onboard both Voyager spacecraft. These amazing nuclear-powered spacecraft were launched in 1977 and are now the most distant manmade objects known, having recently left the solar system on their way into interstellar space.

Prof. Gurnett started his science career by working on spacecraft electronics design as a student employee in The University of Iowa Physics Department in 1959. After completing his B.S. in electrical engineering at Iowa in 1962, he transferred to physics, where he received his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in 1963 and 1965. He was appointed Assistant Professor at the University of Iowa in 1965 with subsequent promotions to Associate Professor and to Full Professor in 1968 and 1972. Prof. Gurnett is considered by many to be the founder of the field of space plasma wave physics and has participated in over 30 spacecraft projects, most notably the Voyager 1 and 2 flights to the outer planets, the Galileo mission to Jupiter, and the Cassini mission to Saturn. Prof. Gurnett has received numerous awards for his research spanning two millenia. These include the 1978 John Howard Dellinger Gold Medal from the International Scientific Radio Union, to the 2005 Hannes Alfven Medal from the European Geosciences Union. In 2004 he was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

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