Joint Polar Satellite System
From our global observations to your local weather forecast
Gregory Mandt has overall responsibility for the JPSS Program. In this role,
he oversees the development, acquisition, integration, installation, and acceptance of major
system elements (spacecraft, instruments, launch services and ground systems) for JPSS
satellites. Before coming to JPSS, he served as System Program Director for the
Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-R Series (GOES-R) program for nine years,
culminating in the successful launch of the GOES-16 satellite in November 2016.
Previously, Mandt served as Director of the National Weather Service (NWS) Office of Science
and Technology, where he was responsible for science and engineering planning, the
acquisition and refresh of critical technologies, and the scientific developments of the
Meteorological Development Laboratory. His previous assignments at NWS included Director of
the Office of Climate, Water, and Weather Services from 2000 to 2005 and Chief of the
Science Branch, Office of Meteorology, from 1996 to 2000.
Mandt also served as the Program Manager and Lead Engineer for the NOAA Polar-orbiting
Operational Environmental Satellite (POES) Program from 1992 to 1996.
During his 14 year tenure as an officer in the United States Air Force, Mandt held several
management and executive-level positions, including Acquisition Manager of the Defense
Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP); Executive Officer for the Space Systems Division;
Chief of the Spacecraft Engineering Branch, DMSP Program Office; Research Engineer in the
Flight Dynamics Laboratory; and Flight Test Engineer.
Mandt holds Master of Science degrees in Systems Engineering and Electrical Engineering from
the Air Force Institute of Technology. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering
Mechanics from the United States Air Force Academy and is also a graduate of the Defense
Systems Management College Program Management Course.
Roger Clason, the NASA deputy program director for JPSS, has worked at NASA since 1990 and has more than 30 years of experience in project/program management and information technology. In this role, he collaborates with the JPSS director in every aspect of the program to ensure its successful implementation.
He most recently served as NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center’s deputy chief information
officer and deputy director of the IT and Communications Directorate. Roger has held various
diverse positions in Goddard’s Flight Projects and Programs Directorate, including project
manager of the Space Network Ground Segment Sustainment (SGSS) mission. He also served in
roles within the Space Communications Division as associate program manager and was the
Ground Network project manager. Roger has received numerous NASA recognitions and has
established productive working relationships with a broad spectrum of stakeholders and
partners including individuals representing all directorates and levels at NASA Goddard and
HQ, other NASA centers and other government agencies, NASA’s international partners, and the
domestic and international commercial space sector.
Roger earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Michigan State University
and a master’s degree in computer science from the University of Colorado, Boulder. He also
holds a Federal Acquisition Certification for Program/Project Managers.
Longenecker has been with NOAA since 1992, when he joined the NOAA Corps from
the US Navy. After retiring in 2012 with more than 29 years of active duty in the uniformed
service, Longenecker took a civilian job with the Office of Program Planning and
Integration, serving as Chief of Staff. Within a year, he was asked to assume the role of
Acting Chief Financial Officer of the National Weather Service, and his understanding of
appropriation law and financial management was deemed an asset to the agency.
Prior to assuming the duties at JPSS, Longenecker was the Chief of the Budget Execution and
Operations Division for the Office of the Chief Financial Officer. In this role, he managed
the execution of more than $6 billion across all NOAA offices. He is the proud recipient of
two NOAA Administrator Awards.
Longenecker holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Auburn
University and masters certificates from George Washington University in Project Management
and Government Contracting.
Kalluri is serving on detail as the JPSS Program Science Advisor, providing critical
support to the JPSS mission by leading the NOAA science team, guiding JPSS in the definition
of low-Earth orbiting science objectives, and serving as a spokesperson for the program
within the science community.
Kalluri has more than 25 years of experience in academia, industry, federally funded
research and development centers, and the government, in developing remote sensing
algorithms, applications and complex satellite ground systems for Earth science missions at
NOAA and NASA. Kalluri received his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland at College
Park in 1994. He led several projects at UMD while working as an assistant research
scientist, including the NOAA-NASA AVHRR Pathfinder program and the NASA Landsat GeoCover
project. Kalluri was the products and algorithms lead for NOAA’s Geostationary
Operational Environmental Satellite - R Series program from 2007 to 2015, where he managed
the development of product generation and distribution system for the mission. He joined the
NOAA Center for Satellite Applications and Research (STAR) as the Chief of the Cooperative
Research Programs Division in 2015. He has served as Chief of the Satellite Meteorology and
Climatology Division since March 2018, where he oversees science support for JPSS, GOES-R,
and multiple other non-NOAA satellite programs.
Kilcoyne currently serves as the Ground Segment Project Manager for JPSS. In this role, she is responsible for the maintenance and sustainment
of the acquisition, routing and processing of the JPSS mission data from the receipt of the data at the polar ground stations through the production
of the data products used by the National Weather Service and other mission partners and customers for weather forecasting and climate studies.
She served as the deputy project manager from June 2015 to July 2018 and transitioned to the role of project manager when the management of the
ground project transitioned from NASA to NOAA in August 2018.
Kilcoyne began her career with NOAA as a contractor serving on the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS),
the predecessor to the JPSS program, in 1997. She supported various proposal efforts for the program, as well as developing and testing algorithms
for the Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument, which is still included on JPSS satellites today. She went on to become the
calibration/validation lead for the NPOESS Data Products Division, leading the development of the Suomi-NPP calibration and validation program.
After the end of NPOESS, Kilcoyne served in roles of increasing responsibility on the JPSS project, including data products and algorithms
integrated product team lead and deputy mission systems engineer for integration and test.
Kilcoyne served as the Product Algorithm Operations Lead for the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES)-R Series Ground Project.
She established an algorithm change process to efficiently incorporate corrections and technology improvements into the operational software. She
provided insight into the science community and their current processes to the development of the NOAA National Environmental Satellite, Data and
Information Service’s Office of Systems Architecture and Advanced Planning.
Kilcoyne has a master’s degree in meteorology and a bachelor’s degree in physical sciences, both from the University of Maryland, College Park.
In his role, Walyus is responsible for the development and launch of JPSS-2 through -4. The first JPSS satellite,
now called NOAA-20, launched successfully in 2017 and is fully operational in orbit. JPSS-2 is scheduled to launch in 2022.
Walyus joined the JPSS Program in 2019. He has worked at NASA for 35 years and at the agency’s Goddard Space Flight Center
in Greenbelt, Maryland, since 1994. He began his NASA career at Johnson Space Center in Houston as a Space Shuttle Descent
Design Engineer.
Walyus went on to serve as the Project Operations Director for the Solar and Heliophysics Observatory, before serving as the
Servicing Mission Operations Manager on the Hubble Space Telescope’s Servicing Mission 4.
Most recently before coming to JPSS, Walyus served as the Deputy Project Manager for the Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation
(GEDI) Lidar and the Project Manager for the International Space Station Transient Astrophysics Observatory (ISS-TAO) Step 2 Proposal.
Walyus holds a bachelor of science degree in aerospace engineering from the University of Maryland, College Park, and a
master of science degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Houston in Texas.
José M. Davis has overall responsibility for managing the integrated NOAA-NASA
Program Systems Engineering (PSE) team. In this role, he has end-to-end responsibility for
requirements and performance of the entire JPSS, ensuring the integrity of the technical
baseline, which includes concepts of operation, architecture, external interfaces and
requirements. He joined NOAA in 2012, after 29 years with NASA.
Dr. Davis served as Lead for Engineering Standards and Processes in the Chief Engineer’s
Office of the NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC), supporting the Chief Engineer and serving as
point of contact for selected programs and projects within the Agency and at GRC. He was a
member of the 2006 –2007 class of the NASA Leadership Development Program (LDP), completing
assignments at NASA Headquarters as a Senior Safety Manager in the Mission Support Division
of the Office of Safety and Mission Assurance. In this role, he supported both the
Constellation and Space Shuttle Programs; and served as a Senior Engineer in the Advanced
Planning and Analysis Division of the Office of the Chief Engineer. Throughout his career,
Dr. Davis has served as a project engineer, supervisor, team lead, project manager, and
systems engineer.
Dr. Davis holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of
Puerto Rico, and Master’s and Doctoral degrees in Industrial Engineering from Cleveland
State University. He has also attended Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and
the Brookings Institution. He has received several NASA individual and team awards.