Dr. Henry Helvajian

Dr. Henry Helvajian is a senior scientist at The Aerospace Corporation and runs the Laboratory for Laser Microengineering Science. The Aerospace Corporation is a private, nonprofit corporation created in 1960 by Congressional decree with the goal to provide research, development, and advisory services to the US Government in the area of space systems development. Henry Helvajian joined The Aerospace Corporation in 1984 after serving as a National Academy of Sciences Post Doctoral Fellow. He has worked on gas phase photochemistry and kinetics of activated radical species for chemical laser development and on the photophysical processes of low fluence laser/material interaction phenomenon. The low fluence laser processing experiments have identified the feasibility of species-selective material modification on the atomic scale. In 1992 he began investigations on the applications of microsystems (MEMS) to space systems and in the miniaturization of satellites and satellite subsystems. He has been the editor of four books on this topic (AIAA/The Aerospace Press; publishers). The last two being Microengineering Aerospace Systems (1999) and Small Satellites: Past, Present and Future (2009). He has been involved in the design of the first 1 kg mass nanosatellite and in the development of various space microthrusters. Recently, he has been developing a laser processing technique for the fabrication of MEMS in glass/ceramic materials and in the development of a glass/ceramic satellite that will be mass producible. He has published over 100 papers and book chapters in microengineering space systems and laser materials processing. He has been asked to Chair numerous conferences both nationally and internationally, from the fundamental (e.g. Gordon Research Conferences, Materials Research Society, European Materials Research Society) to the applied (e.g. SPIE, Laser Precision Microfabrication). He recently stepped down (Jan 2009), after serving for 6 years, as a Chair of the SPIE’s Photonics West/LASE Conference which is the largest photonics conference in North America that draws over 17,000 attendants. As a co-inventor, Dr. Helvajian is the first recipient of The Aerospace Corporation’s Howard Katzman Innovation Award. To date Dr. Helvajian holds 8 patents. Dr. Helvajian received his BS and MS degrees in Electrical Engineering/Quantum Electronics from Stanford University and his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering/Quantum Electronics from University of Southern California.