MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov
Contact: Franklin O'Donnell
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 26, 1998
MUIRHEAD TO LEAD DEEP SPACE 4/CHAMPOLLION MISSION
Brian K. Muirhead, project manager for NASA's Mars
Pathfinder mission that delivered a lander and rover to the
surface of Mars, has been named project manager for the Deep
Space 4/Champollion mission to a comet.
Planned for launch in 2003, the Deep Space 4/Champollion
spacecraft will rendezvous with Comet Tempel 1 in 2005 and spend
several months orbiting the comet nucleus making high-resolution
maps of its surface. The spacecraft will deploy a lander with a
1-meter-long (3.3-foot) drill to collect samples that will be
analyzed on-site; an attempt will be made to return a sample to
Earth in 2010.
The project is part of the Deep Space mission series under
the NASA/JPL New Millennium Program, designed to perform flight
demonstrations of new spacecraft technologies for solar system
and Earth-orbiting missions.
A native of Chicago, Muirhead joined JPL in 1978 and has
worked on missions including Galileo to Jupiter and the Earth-
orbiting Spaceborne Imaging Radar (SIR-C). Muirhead also managed
JPL's Advanced Spacecraft Development Group and Mechanical
Systems Integration Section. He joined the Mars Pathfinder
mission as flight system manager and was responsible for the
design, development, test and launch of the spacecraft. After
launch, he served as deputy project manager before being named
project manager upon Pathfinder's successful landing in July
1997.
Muirhead holds a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering
from the University of New Mexico and a master's degree in
aeronautical engineering from the California Institute of
Technology.
JPL is managed for NASA by Caltech.
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