Meet NASA Astronaut & Artemis Team Member Kayla Barron [Video]

2017 NASA Astronaut Candidate Kayla Baron. Credit: NASA/Bill Stafford

NASA astronaut Kayla Barron is a member of the Artemis Team, a select group of astronauts charged with focusing on the development and training efforts for early Artemis missions.

Kayla Barron was selected by NASA to join the 2017 Astronaut Candidate Class. She reported for duty in August 2017 and completed two years of training as an Astronaut Candidate. The Washington native graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy with a bachelor’s degree in Systems Engineering. A Gates Cambridge Scholar, Barron earned a master’s degree in Nuclear Engineering from the University of Cambridge. As a Submarine Warfare Officer, Barron was a member of the first class of women commissioned into the submarine community.

Barron was commissioned as a Navy officer in 2010 and immediately attended graduate school. Her graduate research focused on modeling the fuel cycle for a next-generation, thorium-fueled nuclear reactor concept. Following graduate school, Barron attended the U.S. Navy’s nuclear power and submarine officer training before being assigned to the USS Maine, an Ohio-class ballistic missile submarine homeported in Bangor, Washington. Barron qualified as a submarine warfare officer and completed three strategic deterrent patrols while serving as a division officer aboard the Maine. At the time of her selection, Barron was serving as the Flag Aide to the Superintendent of the U.S. Naval Academy.

Through the Artemis program NASA and a coalition of international partners will return to the Moon to learn how to live on other worlds for the benefit of all. With Artemis missions NASA will send the first woman and the next man to the Moon in 2024 and about once per year thereafter.

Through the efforts of humans and robots, we will explore more of the Moon than ever before; to lead a journey of discovery that benefits our planet with life changing science, to use the Moon and its resources as a technology testbed to go even farther and to learn how to establish and sustain a human presence far beyond Earth.