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NICHOLAS J. M. PATRICK (PH.D., P.E.)
NASA ASTRONAUT (MISSION SPECIALIST)
PERSONAL DATA: Dr. Patrick was born in 1964 in North Yorkshire in the United Kingdom, but considers London, England and Rye, New York to be his hometowns. He became a US Citizen in 1994. His mother, Gillian Patrick, lives in South Norwalk, Connecticut; his father, Stewart Patrick, in Narberth, Pennsylvania. He is married. His recreational interests include flying, reading, fixing & building things, hiking, and scuba diving.
EDUCATION:
Harrow School, London, England, 1978-82.
B.A., Engineering, University of Cambridge, England, 1986.
M.A. Cantab., Engineering, University of Cambridge, England, 1990.
S.M., Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1990.
Ph.D., Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1996.
ORGANIZATIONS: Dr Patrick is a member of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, and is a registered Professional Engineer.
SPECIAL HONORS: Entrance scholarship (‘Exhibition’) to the University of Cambridge (Trinity College), 1983; GE Aircraft Engines Development Program Project Award for contributions to manufacturing inventory reduction, 1988; JSC Center Director’s Discretionary Award for Contributions to the User Interface Design of Space Shuttle Program’s Cockpit Avionics Upgrade, 2002.
Dr. Patrick holds three patents in the areas of telerobotics, display design, and integrated aircraft alerting systems.
EXPERIENCE: While at the University of Cambridge, Dr. Patrick learned to fly as a member of the Royal Air Force’s Cambridge University Air Squadron, and spent his summers as a civil engineer in New York and Connecticut. After graduating from Cambridge, he moved to Boston, Massachusetts, where he worked for four years as an engineer for the Aircraft Engines Division of General Electric.
He then attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he was a teaching assistant and then a research assistant in the Human-Machine Systems Laboratory in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. His research interests included telerobotics, aviation psychology, decision theory, optimization, and econometrics. While at MIT, he worked as a flight instructor at Hanscom Field’s East Coast Aero Club, and as a statistician and programmer for a medical and robotic products company, and served on the Board of Stockholders of the Harvard Cooperative Society.
Upon completion of his doctorate, Dr. Patrick joined Boeing’s Commercial Airplane Group in Seattle, Washington, where he worked in Flight Deck Engineering as a Systems and Human Factors Engineer on many of Boeing’s commercial aircraft models. While in Seattle, he was also a flight instructor at Boeing Field’s Galvin Flying Service.
Dr. Patrick has logged over 1,700 hours as a pilot—including over 800 hours as a flight instructor—in more than 20 types of airplane and helicopter.
NASA EXPERIENCE: Selected by NASA in June 1998, he reported for training in August 1998. Astronaut Candidate Training included orientation briefings and tours, numerous scientific and technical briefings, intensive instruction in Shuttle and International Space Station systems, physiological training and ground school to prepare for T-38 flight training, as well as learning water and wilderness survival techniques.
Dr. Patrick is currently assigned to the Space Station Branch as the Crew Support Astronaut for the 8th ISS Expedition crew. He will serve in technical assignments until assigned to a space flight.
JUNE 2004
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