Dr. Rebecca Thombre has worked as Research Scientist at Blue Marble Space Institute of Science, Washington, USA, Visiting Researcher at University of Kent, UK and an Assistant Professor in Biotechnology at Modern College, Pune, India. She has an experience of more than 18 years in Microbiology, Space microbiology and Molecular Biology. She has an undergraduate and postgraduate degree in Microbiology from University of Mumbai. Her doctoral research focused on studying the extremozyme CGTase from alkaliphiles isolated from Lonar lake, a meteorite impact crater. Her postdoctoral research was on Astrobiology studies related to the physiology and response of extremophiles to space-related stress and simulated Mars conditions like perchlorate, salinity, hypergravity, microgravity and impact stress. She received the European Union - Europlanet Transnational Access (TA) travel award for studying extremophiles from salt lagoons in Spain. She was the Principal Scientific Investigator for projects on Astrobiology funded by Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) - SPPU Space Technology cell. She has published more than 50 papers, 12 book chapters, 3 books and worked as an Editor and Reviewer for many journals published by Frontiers, Springer, Taylor and Francis CRC Press and Elsevier. Parag Vaishampayan is the Space Biology Portfolio Scientist at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley. He providesoverall scientific leadership and direction to maintain the scientific integrity of projects within the ARC Space Biology Portfolio. Hesupports more than 70 active space biology projects to better understand how spaceflight affects living systems in simulated groundbasedexperiments, the International Space Station (ISS), and preparing future human exploration missions beyond low Earth orbit (BLO).Before joining Ames, he worked at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) since 2008. He has successfully managed several multi-year,multi-institutional research projects. He has supported planetary protection implementation for several NASA missions, including MarsScience Laboratory (Curiosity rover), InSight, Mars2020 (Perseverance rover), Mars Cube One or MarCO, and Psyche. His researchwork has appeared in more than 60 peer-reviewed publications, book chapters, and more than 50 presentations. He was instrumentalin developing and implementing several novel molecular approaches, instruments, and bioinformatics analysis tools widely used bymicrobial ecologists. He is a leading microbial ecologist and bioinformatician working in the field of space biology, astrobiology, andplanetary protection. He is the recipient of several prestigious honors and awards, such as the NASA Exceptional Public Service Medal(2017), JPL Explorer Award (2016), Voyager Award (2015, 2016), and Mariner Award (2012).
