| Kellie Gerardi | |
| Birth Date: | February 16, 1989[1] |
| Birth Place: | Jupiter, Florida |
| Alma Mater: | |
| Occupation: | Astronaut and bioastronautics researcher |
| Employer: | Palantir Technologies |
| Known For: | Spaceflight and commercial citizen science |
| Children: | Delta V |
| Awards: | Leif Erikson Young Explorer Award |
Kellie Gerardi (born February 16, 1989) is an American commercial citizen scientist who is known for her sub-orbital spaceflight with Virgin Galactic and candidacy for the Mars One mission. She was one of the first 100 women in space. She is also a successful social media influencer, science communicator and media professional in private spaceflight.
Gerardi graduated from Jupiter Community High School in 2007, in the town of Jupiter, Florida, where she was born. She said she watched space shuttles launch from Cape Canaveral from her bedroom window.[2] [3]
She studied documentary film making at Barnard College and transferred to New York University (NYU). She graduated from NYU in 2011 with a Bachelor of Arts in film.
In 2012, she joined the Commercial Spaceflight Federation, a commercial spaceflight lobbyist, as a media specialist and copywriter.[4] [5]
From 2014 to 2020, Girardi worked in business development at Masten Space Systems.
In 2015, she began working with Palantir Technologies, a Peter Thiel software company, as a customer support specialist. Her title is missions operations lead[6] on what Palantir describes as the "logistical special forces unit," which provides customer service and acts as a travel agency. She said she is a technical project manager for Gotham, which she described as a philanthropic effort, a controversial data analysis tool that is used by law enforcement and government agencies, like U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to screen immigrants at the Mexico–United States border. She said she was sent to help Team Rubicon provide disaster relief to people impacted by Hurricane Harvey in 2017.[7]
After meeting Richard Garriott while working coat check at The Explorers Club in 2014, she decided to join. She later served on the board of directors. She now serves the Truman National Security Project as part of the Defense Council.[8]
In 2014, she was accepted as candidate for the Mars One mission, a bankrupt organization that planned to colonize Mars as a reality television show, which gained her national attention.[9] [10] She then spent two months training as a crew member at the Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS). In 2015, she wrote an essay in Popular Mechanics about her experience at the MDRS, where she ate insects like tarantulas and practiced moving in a space suit.[11] [12] In an interview with Popular Science, she said they tested the ability to grow hops in a simulated Martian regolith using Earthen soil as a control. She said the experiments showed beer could be brewed on Mars.[13] [14] In 2017, Gerardi joined a private education and research facility in Denver called the International Institute for Astronautical Sciences (IIAS) that uses Florida Institute of Technology for accreditation.[15] Girardi completed a program called "Project PoSSUM," which consists of a five-day course and online webinars that costs more than $20,000 and says it trains citizen astronauts.[16] The program conducts bioastronautics research and space-suit technology development.[17] She said she was motivated to democratize space access, and believes a "tidal wave of scientific research" can come from it.[18]
On November 2, 2023, Gerardi flew the one-hour sub-orbital spaceflight operated by the space tourism company Virgin Galactic, Galactic 05, as a citizen scientist doing commercial research.[19] Onboard, she collected bioastronautical research data for three experiments on microgravity healthcare and fluid dynamics developed by the National Research Council. IIAS sponsored her trip.[20] She wore a smart garment called Astroskin by a Canadian startup Hexoskin that continuously tracked her vitals and a glucose monitor to investigate any relation between high-altitude flight and insulin resistance.[21] [22] The fluid dynamics tests were to inform future designs of syringes and humidifiers.
Gerardi is a popular TikTok influencer. As of March 2024, she had over 764,000 followers.[23] As of March 2024, she had over 500,000 followers on Instagram. Gerardi "[believes] in the democratization of access to space and the expansion of Earth's economicsphere",[24] for "researchers to use space as a laboratory to benefit humanity",[25] and advocates for “the science and engineering of space exploration.[26] She has brand partnerships with Land Rover, Sephora, and TJ Maxx.[27] In 2024, she partnered with Sun Chips.[28] In 2021 and 2023, she walked in New York Fashion Week shows, wearing her navy space suit[29] and a space-themed dress she designed, respectively.[30] In 2021, Gerardi partnered with NASA to host the first all-female episode of NASA Science Live during Women's History Month.[31]
In 2020, Mango Publishing published her memoir, Not Necessarily Rocket Science: A Beginner's Guide To Life in the Space Age.[32] [33]
Gerardi writes a series of children's books about space called Luna Muna.[34]
In 2015, her space-themed wedding at Woodstock Inn & Resort in Vermont to Steve Baumrak was featured in The Knot.[35] [36] It was one of four weddings officiated by astronaut Michael López-Alegría, a commander of the International Space Station.[37]
She lives in Jupiter with Baumrak and their daughter Delta V, who was named for delta-v, the quantitative measure of a change in velocity.