Ralph Lorenz

Dr. Ralph Lorenz has wide-ranging interests in science and engineering, especially relating to planetary science (with an emphasis on surface/atmosphere interactions on Titan, Venus, and Mars) and doing science from innovative sensor platforms such as probes, landers, balloons, penetrators, and boats. He has been involved in the life cycle of flight investigations, including concept formulation, mission and system design, science planning, observation design, instrument development, data analysis, and publication of results. His experience includes radar remote sensing, in situ instrumentation, geomorphology, meteorology, oceanography, vehicle dynamics and trajectory measurements, and astrobiology. Dr. Lorenz is a NASA participating scientist on the JAXA Akatsuki Venus Climate Orbiter and on InSight at Mars, a co-investigator for the SuperCam microphone experiment on Perseverance, and lead for the Atmospheric Structure Investigation on the proposed DAVINCI+ Venus probe, currently in a Phase A study. He is the Dragonfly mission architect, a role that involves considering how the vehicle and its payload will interact with the Titan environment and developing engineering specifications for that environment. He has authored >300 popular and technical publications ranging from brief articles and papers to book-length works. His terrestrial fieldwork has focused on studying desert areas, including dust devils and sand dunes.