Michael Moses, BS Physics and Astronomy ’89, MSAAE ’95, President, Virgin Galactic

As president of Virgin Galactic, a company devising technologies to send tourists and researchers into space, Michael Moses employs the critical-thinking skills he learned at Purdue and refined during a 16-year career at NASA. “Purdue taught me how to solve problems that didn’t have answers in the back of the book,” he says.

Moses served as flight controller, flight controller group lead, flight director and launch integration manager at NASA. In his last three years at NASA, he oversaw 12 space shuttle missions as the program’s launch integration manager. He also was a two-time recipient of the NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal as well as other NASA commendations and awards.

At Virgin Galactic, Moses is helping transform civilian space flight and all aspects of its commercial human spaceflight program, including vehicle processing, flight planning and astronaut training. After a career of working alongside talented engineers, Moses has made another discovery.

“Purdue engineers usually excel when given only half the problem and are left to figure out on their own what to do next,” he says. “This is an invaluable advantage and really sets Purdue grads apart from the pack.”