(gentle music)
- My name is Thomas Zurbuchen, also known as Dr. Z.
- And I'm Ellen Stofan, also known as Dr. E.
Welcome to another episode of "E.Z. Science."
So we're here at
the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum.
And this is an amazing exhibit that I'm so excited about.
It's called If Then She Can,
which is all about if you can see it, you can believe it,
and we want girls to know they can.
They can become scientists, engineers, and technologists.
We have 120 3D printed orange plastic statues
all of women who are currently right now changing the world
in science, technology, engineering, and math.
It's the largest group of statues
of women ever brought together
by the Lyda Hill Philanthropies.
But what is really important to me is in the few weeks
we've had this at the Smithsonian,
we've had many of the women who these are statue of
here with us.
- And I had an opportunity to speak
with Dr. Kelly Korreck today, who I know for over 20 years
because 17 years ago or so she graduated with a doctorate
and I happened to be the PhD advisor.
And I followed her career from the Smithsonian.
She's currently working at NASA Headquarters.
Hey Kelly, it's just wonderful to see you here.
And you being honored,
one of the statues that we're looking at,
you were a student of mine and graduated 17 years ago
with a doctorate.
What happen since then, Kelly?
- Well, thank you so much, Thomas.
Yeah, the last 17 years has been so exciting,
done a variety of things.
Went, first of all, to the Center for Astrophysics,
the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
up in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where I did a postdoc
and studied stars that explode
as well as jets coming out of galaxies.
Then moved on to start building instruments
and focusing on the sun,
which was really one of my first loves
and work I've done with you as a graduate student.
I worked on NASA's Parker Solar Probe,
the mission to touch the sun,
and part of that instrument suite
that was able to fly into the corona
for the first time last year.
- Just wonderful.
So you of course built one of the hottest instruments
actually ever built for space research,
an instrument that's on the outside of the heat shield.
Tell us what's the most important thing you figured out
in your own research that relates to that instrument?
- Right, the things that I figured out specifically was
to look at coronal mass ejections,
or these billions of tons of material,
equivalent to 80 million school buses,
racing towards us at millions of miles an hour
and how they're different.
And we've saw for the first time, the closest,
the birth of these CMEs with Parker and how they evolve,
and how they are a little different
than what they look like in at Earth.
And so that's why we need to go
all these different vantage points
to really understand space weather.
- I have to tell you how when I was a grad student
and a postdoc, I dreamed of those data.
I'm just so proud that you are able
to make those first observations close to the sun
of these amazing phenomena,
which of course shape astrophysics.
What is your advice to young girls
about potential careers in science?
- Stay curious.
Figure out what problem you wanna solve
and then ask the questions that are going
to help you solve that.
Work together, find someone who inspires you,
surround yourself with people who are curious
and interesting, and you'll do great things.
- You being honored as part of that exhibit,
it means just a lot to me personally,
because I'm so proud of you, of what you have achieved.
- Well, thank you so much.
- That was such a great conversation with Kelly.
And earlier I got to speak with Dana Bolles.
- I know Dana from the work that she does at NASA.
And I wanna tell you,
what she's really helping us with is how
to communicate science, not only individually
to young girls and learners of all ages,
but also rebuilding our entire websites
that communicate science to large audiences worldwide.
- Dana, I'm so excited to have you here today
at the Air and Space Museum,
and I'm so inspired by your statue.
What is it like to see yourself in orange plastic?
- Oh, it's really weird.
It's really strange.
I never thought I would see a statue of myself,
much less a full scale size one.
And being part of collection is just an amazing experience.
And meeting the other ambassadors,
I'm so honored to be part of such a group.
- And what's your story?
How did you get inspired to go into space?
- I was born with this disability.
And so when I was younger, I thought that the best job
in the world would be to be in space
where I could float around and I wouldn't need the chair,
and I didn't have to look up at people.
And it just felt like a perfect job to have.
When I was younger, I wanted to be an astronaut,
and as I got older, I focused more on engineering
because I realized that I depend a lot on equipment
to be independent from my chair and my arms,
and especially equipment to drive my van.
So based on all those things
it just felt natural to choose engineering.
- You've had some really interesting roles at NASA.
Can you tell us about a few of them?
- My very first job with NASA was at
the Kennedy Space Center.
I was a payload safety engineer
and that was an incredible way to be introduced to NASA.
I mean the excitement of working
for America's space program.
And we used to approve everything
that went up on the shuttle
or the expendable launch vehicles, the rockets,
and I loved everything about it.
Just learning about the International Space Station
and working on the Mars Orbiter.
It was just excellent.
And then a few years later, I transferred to AIMS
and then I worked three years
as a ISS payload logistics lead.
And now I was working with the project
that would put up biological experiments
on the International Space Station.
- So amazing, all that is such great science
and it's really moving exploration forward.
And what's your role now at NASA headquarters?
- Now I am working for the Science Engagement
and Partnerships Division
under the Science Mission Directory.
And I manage the day-to-day operations
of the science.nasa.gov website.
So how can we get our science
out to the widest possible audience?
And right now we are focused more on this special project
where we're modernizing and we are reducing our footprint
and improving the user experience to our website.
- That's so important,
that whole piece of how we communicate what we do
to the public to engage and inspire.
And so what advice do you give
to young women when you meet them?
- The best advice I can give is
to figure out what you love to do,
'cause if you get a job doing that
then you won't work a day in your life.
And more importantly, don't let others expectations of you,
of what they think you should be doing,
don't let that sway you from your dreams
because you have the power to make it happen.
- That was such an amazing conversation.
You know, she is so inspiring to me.
I just can't believe what girls must think
when they come in here and see these statues
and get inspired by these women.
- I'm just so inspired, not only as a scientist,
as a leader, but also as a father of a daughter
who's also thinking about science as a future
and as one that tries to inspire many others.
I'm just so proud of them and excited
for what this exhibit can do in so many lives.
- Well at the Smithsonian,
we're mostly used to celebrating women from history.
But what I love about this exhibit is
that we're celebrating women right now
who are making such a difference.
And that's really exciting to me.
Thank you for joining us.
And we look forward to the next episode
of "E.Z. Science."
(gentle music)