Dr. James Patton Downey

Assistant Mission Scientist

... a triple threat. Most scientists have expertise in one field and have to learn how to converse with colleagues in other fields. James Patton Downey of the Space Sciences Laboratory at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center jokes that he can ignore scientists in three disciplines at once.

Downey, the MSL-1 assistant mission scientist, was a triple major in physics, math, and chemistry at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.

"It allows you be a jack of all trades," Downey said during a break in the middle of MSL-1 first day in orbit. "That way, if I'm in a meeting with a bunch of physicists, I can pretend that I'm a chemist."

Actually, he looks at his triple major as giving him a broader view of the potential for science in space.

"If you look at the history of science, most discoveries have been made by people from one field looking at what is going on in another field," he explained. "I enjoy having a little knowledge of many fields. I've always enjoyed scientific exploration. Space is an enjoyable scientific frontier."

For his graduate work, he had to specialize a bit, and majored in numerical simulations of polymer interdiffusion. Basically, that means he worked on math models of how long-chain molecules move past each other, an important aspect of the work being done aboard MSL-1. (For fun, he likes to move a soccer ball past other players. He was a starter on a men's team in a state finals three years ago, and still works as a high school and college referee and instructor.)

Downey is not directly involved in any single MSL-1 experiment. Rather, as assistant mission scientist he helps balance the needs of the various science teams against the resources available from the shuttle. After the mission, he will resume work in the new position of lead discipline scientist for biotechnology at Marshall.

This time he will be helping scientists to get their flight experiments developed and flown, a task that will take him into space station. It's a familiar path. Downey's father, James Sr., was overall director of the early Spacelab missions in the 1970s and '80s.

April 5, 1997
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Author: David Dooling
Curator: Bryan Walls
NASA Official: John M. Horack