PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Contact: John G. Watson

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                         October 31, 1997

JPL ANNOUNCES NEW TECHNOLOGY AND APPLICATIONS DIRECTOR

     Michael Sander has been named director of JPL's Technology and Applications 
Program (TAP) Directorate, JPL director Edward C. Stone announced.  Sander replaces 
acting TAP Director Dr. R. Rhoads Stephenson.

     Sander will oversee two complementary programs within the TAP organization. The 
Technology Program encompasses advanced technology development activities that enable 
the successful execution of future space missions, performs research and 
development for NASA (and sponsors other than NASA) and transfers JPL-developed 
technology to U.S. industry. The Applications Program recognizes that JPL, as a major 
national laboratory, has an obligation to serve society by participating in solving 
problems in areas where JPL's special competencies can make a significant 
contribution.

     Since February 1995, Sander has served as deputy director of JPL's Space and 
Earth Science Programs Directorate and as project manager for JPL's Develop New 
Products reengineering activities. Previously, he was manager of JPL's Spaceborne 
Imaging Radar-C/X-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (SIR-C/X-SAR) project. With JPL since 
1963, Sander has worked in various capacities in JPL management and project 
organizations, including management of JPL's Mission Control Center. His early career 
was spent processing science data from the first missions to Mercury, Venus, Mars, 
Jupiter and beyond.

     In the early 1980's, Sander left JPL for five years to serve at NASA 
Headquarters in Washington, D.C., first as the deputy director of the Life Sciences 
Division and then as the director of the Shuttle Payloads Engineering Division, where 
he was responsible for Spacelab and other scientific payloads on the Space Shuttle. 

     Born in Jerusalem, he earned a bachelor's degree in physics from Occidental 
College in Los Angeles. A three-time recipient of the NASA Outstanding Leadership 
Medal for his work on the Voyager mission, Spacelab One and the SIR-C Project, Sander 
is an associate fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He 
and his wife, Jane, live in Thousand Oaks.

     NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory is a division of the California Institute of 
Technology, Pasadena, California.
                         
                           #####
10/31/97JGW
#9796