Clarkson Research Professor Dana Barry has her name aboard Japan’s Hayabusa -2 spacecraft that recently returned to Earth with samples from the asteroid Ryugu. The spacecraft was launched in 2014 and arrived at Ryugu in 2018 where it collected several samples. Scientists hope the precious samples, which are expected to amount to no more than 0.1 grams of material, will teach us about the origin and evolution of our solar system and help efforts to defend Earth from potential asteroid impacts.
Hayabusa-2 plans to visit two more asteroids during the next 10 years. Asteroids are rocky bodies orbiting the Sun. They are especially found between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. It is interesting to note that the asteroid Ryugu is named for a Japanese folktale about a magical palace at the bottom of the sea.
Dr. Dana Barry previously worked in Clarkson’s Space Grant Program, has carried out NASA-related mission work, and is a member of the Planetary Society. Her mentor for the Ph.D. degree (which she earned in 2011 at Osaka University in Japan) is Professor Toshihiro Tanaka (a Vice President of Osaka University who has experiments aboard the International Space Station). Dr. Barry is a Research Professor in Clarkson University’s Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, an Instructional Support Assistant at SUNY Canton, Scientific Board President and Professor for Ansted University, and a Chemistry Ambassador and officer for the American Chemical Society. She has five graduate degrees and close to 300 professional/academic publications (including four Springer Nature textbooks). Her numerous honors include 20 Consecutive APEX Awards for Publication Excellence from Communications Concepts in Springfield, VA, a Marquis Who’s Who Lifetime Achievement Award in 2017 for her outstanding professional contributions, and an Outstanding Volunteer Award from the American Chemical Society in 2017. In addition, she received an Outstanding Achievement Award from the Materials Research Society of Japan (MRS-J) in 2019.