Dr. Dr. Richard J. Blakeslee
Senior Research Scientist
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center

Dr. Richard J. Blakeslee of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., is a senior research scientist at the Global Hydrology and Climate Center, based at the National Space Science and Technology Center in Huntsville.

His primary research areas include thunderstorm and atmospheric electricity research, global electric circuit studies, satellite-based, airborne, and ground-based lightning measurements, and lightning instrumentation. He presently serves as the lead validation scientist for the Lightning Imaging Sensor (LIS) on the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite.

He is a lead researcher for the fourth Convection And Moisture EXperiment (CAMEX-4) - a series of field investigations to better understand hurricanes. He is the principal investigator for the "Total Lightning Measurements of Tropical Precipitating Systems" experiment. Data obtained by this research will help scientists explore what lightning and storm electrification can tell us about the atmospheric processes associated with convection and how lightning observations can contribute to improved forecasts.

Dr. Blakeslee has a bachelor's degree in physics from the Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and master's and doctorate degrees in atmospheric sciences from the University of Arizona in Tucson.

His awards and special recognitions include five NASA Group Achievement Awards, four Marshall Space Flight Center Special Service Awards, and a Marshall Center Patent Award. He is the author of numerous technical publications on lightning and atmospheric research.