With all the brouhaha about declining education results, cuts to our university systems and the general disregard for science from our GOP electeds…in the shadow of the success of the New Horizons spacecraft flyby of Pluto…I have to wonder…will we have a next generation of space scientists? Will the USA continue to be a leader in hard science research and development or will eventually become an also ran?
Members of the New Horizons science team react to seeing the spacecraft’s last and sharpest image of Pluto before closest approach later in the day, Tuesday, July 14, 2015 at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)
With that question in mind, check out this NASA photo of the New Horizons team. Not a lot of women or minorities in the current lot (but that’s been a long term dig against science) but very few of these people even look like they are under 50….just sayin: