CANEUS 2009 Workshops

Henry Helvajian

The Aerospace Corporation, USA

Dr. Henry Helvajian is a senior scientist at The Aerospace Corporation and runs the Laboratory for Laser Microengineering Science. The Aerospace Corporation is a private, nonprofit corporation created in 1960 by Congressional decree with the goal to provide research, development, and advisory services to the US Government in the area of space systems development. Henry Helvajian joined The Aerospace Corporation in 1984 after serving as a National Academy of Sciences Post Doctoral Fellow. He has worked on gas phase photochemistry and kinetics of activated radical species for chemical laser development and on the photophysical processes of low fluence laser/material interaction phenomenon. The low fluence laser processing experiments have identified the feasibility of species-selective material modification on the atomic scale. In 1992 he began investigations on the applications of microsystems (MEMS) to space systems and in the miniaturization of satellites and satellite subsystems. He has been involved in the design of the first 1 kg mass nanosatellite and in the development of various space microthrusters. Recently, he has been developing a laser processing technique for the fabrication of MEMS in glass/ceramic materials and in the development of a glass/ceramic satellite.