posted 11-23-2023 11:03 AM               

Michael's passion for space fueled an illustrious and lifelong career; in fact, he was designing space optics up until his untimely death. In 1967, Michael began his work at the UC Berkeley Space Sciences Lab (SSL), where he worked for fifty-four years.

During his tenure at SSL, he would file numerous patents and author over 350 papers. Michael was UC Berkeley's first rocket scientist (though he is quick to admit that he was working on the nose cone, not the ignition source).

In 1977, Michael was selected for the honor of becoming a NASA Payload Specialist. This NASA program trained scientists, researchers, teachers, and other civilians to carry out scientific experiments in space. He served as a backup payload specialist to his good friend Byron K. Lichtenburg for mission STS-9, or Spacelab 1, in 1983. He was selected to be the active payload specialist for missions STS-51-H, STS-61-K and STS-45. 1985-1989. Unfortunately, Michael was never able to make it into space.

Several of his intended missions were canceled or postponed for various reasons, and Michael became gravely ill with cancer prior to the launch of his final mission. Despite not being able to make it into orbit, Michael recovered from cancer after several bouts of chemotherapy, and eventually a self-bone-marrow transplant. He was able to serve as Capcom, or the central point of communication between the astronauts and Mission Control, for STS-45.

During his long career collaborating with NASA, he assisted on missions such as EUVE (Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer) and FAUST (Far Ultraviolet Space Telescope). He also partnered with the Department of Energy to observe and measure dark matter in projects such as the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI), and the Supernova Acceleration Probe (SNAP). He also participated in UC Berkeley's research project, Fire Urgency Estimator in Geostationary Orbit (FUEGO), an initiative to observe the western United States from space in order to identify and track wildfires.