Speaker Biography

Joel C. Sercel, PhD

Founder and CEO

Trans Astronautica Corporation (TransAstra)

Founding CTO

Momentus

Joel C. Sercel, PhD, is the Founder and CEO of Trans Astronautica Corporation (TransAstra) and the Founding CTO of Momentus. Sercel is a world recognized authority in technical innovation and space technology with a PhD from Caltech in microwave plasma propulsion and over three decades of success in engineering and leadership across multiple disciplines. A former Principal Engineer and Project Manager at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory with 15 years of entrepreneurial success, Sercel has a long history of leading first in space and advanced technology. When at JPL, Sercel formulated the NSTAR project which lead to the first deep space application of ion propulsion and the Dawn spacecraft flying to the asteroids Vesta and Ceres. Sercel is a five time NASA Innovative Advance Concepts (NIAC) Fellow and a leading expert on how to harvest water from planetary bodies and use it for space transportation services. Sercel believes that humanity will thrive as a species once we make the leap and homestead the solar system. With the recent swarm of technological breakthroughs in information systems, manufacturing, sensor systems, and robotics, now is the time to move from dreaming about homesteading space, to doing it. TransAstra and Momentus are working together under Sercel’s leadership to build the technology to provide in-space transportation and related services with a fleet of reusable space tugs supplied by propellant derived from asteroid and lunar resources.