Director of Buseck Center for Meteorite Studies Perpetuates Passion for Space Science

Rhonda Stroud, Director of the Buseck Center for Meteorite Studies and professor at ASU’s School of Earth and Space Exploration, became a science enthusiast at a very young age when her preschool teacher introduced her to the mysteries of our solar system.

“He used to put out big pieces of white paper and draw and talk to us about science. And one day, he talked about stars and how our Sun is like a giant exploding bomb. And for each of his lessons, one kid got to take the giant piece of paper home. And that was my day to take a piece of paper.”

When asked what has kept her passion for science and discovery alive since that day in preschool, Stroud responded as any true scholar would.

“It's just love,” Stroud said simply. “What I love about physics and planetary science is the exploration… the wonder of how the world got to be as it is right now. Trying to understand the way the world works.”

Given her long and accomplished career in space science, Stroud has a greater understanding of this than most. 

Before coming to ASU, Stroud was the head of the Nanoscale Materials section at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) for 15 years, after also being a staff scientist there. She has contributed her knowledge and skills to many other major players in the space industry, such as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the Department of Energy (DOE), and the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD). 

Since 2000, NASA has continuously funded Stroud to do research on various projects. She "feels very fortunate" to have participated in several NASA planetary science programs. Her collaborations with international space agencies have also been extensive.

During her career, Stroud has collaborated through sample return missions, such as the Stardust mission and the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) Hayabusa II mission, with researchers all over the world and representatives of JAXA, the European Space Agency (ESA), and the German Aerospace Center (DLR).

These missions result from international collaborations, drawing scientists and instruments from different space agencies across the globe. Part of the mission hardware is also built by private companies. An example of this is the Stardust mission, built and operated in collaboration with Lockheed Martin. From all of these creative and collaborative relationships, Stroud has learned some important truths.

“It helps to remember that science is a human endeavor. It's not some set of preordained facts that we're working through or just uncovering. It's actually something that we decide, as a society, as a community, to work on,” said Stroud. “Collectively, we set agendas for what the important questions are, and then we figure out how to gather the resources to address those questions.”

“There's been a lot of change in the nearly 30 years since I got my PhD,” said Stroud, “in terms of how we bring people in, how researchers have prioritized inclusivity as a goal in science. The scientific community realizes we are missing important perspectives. What is important in our science agenda depends on who we're listening to.”

Stroud is happy to have contributed to the change of bringing more voices into the decision-making. She has taken these important lessons with her into her current role as director of the Buseck Center for Meteorite Studies at ASU. 

“The Buseck Center for Meteorite Studies holds one of the world's best meteorite collections. We have one of the largest of any university, with more meteorites here than at many major museums. We can provide these as a resource to researchers here at ASU and researchers around the world,” said Stroud. “We loan out the samples, and we use them as outreach tools.”

Ten-thousand K-12 students a year come through the meteorite gallery. So, everybody from kindergarteners to officials at NASA comes to look at our samples. “It's a big responsibility to curate this resource for the state of Arizona, for ASU, and for the world in general.”

In giving back to the ASU community, and the greater community of Arizona, through this vast collection of space rock samples, Stroud's story has effectively come full circle. She is now the one holding up a poster and inspiring the next generation to explore the possibilities of space.

Still, Stroud is not content to rest on her laurels. She has her eyes always on the future and the potential impact she can make to science as a whole.

“I would love to work with people interested in bringing back samples from the Moon and people thinking about in-situ resource utilization,” Stroud said. “There are people actively working on concepts for interstellar dust collection and sampling; such missions have been proposed. I would love it if they were sample returns.”

Her interests also include cosmic dust. In terms of astronomical missions, some researchers think of dust as getting in the way. Stroud thinks of dust as the building blocks. In her dream career, if someone gave Stroud $10 billion, she would love to lead a cryogenic sample return from a comet. That would be really exciting for her.

When asked to summarize her overall purpose as a lifetime researcher and student of space science, Stroud explained simply that “it's about understanding, really, the nature of what's out there.”