Woodbridge, VA — Melonie Ariana Blackburn is being recognized by Continental Who’s Who as a Top Engineer for her outstanding achievements in the field of engineering and her exemplary contributions at NOAA Satellite Operations Facility.
Having led an impressive career in engineering, Ms. Melonie Ariana Blackburn encourages women to pursue STEM fields. She was inspired to enter the space field at six years old, and has always excelled in math and physics. In her current capacity, she excels a flight software engineering for Arctic Slope Regional Corporation at the NOAA Satellite Operations Facility. She is responsible for generating procedures to run against spacecraft simulators, developing command procedures, telemetry display pages, and real-time plots, and overseeing pre-launch testing of GOES-R/S subsystems. Prior to her current role, she gained valuable knowledge as a lead flight operations simulation engineer on the NASA NPP Flight Vehicle Simulator at NOAA Satellite Operations Facility.
In light of her academic achievements, Ms. Blackburn obtained her Bachelor of Science degree in Physics from West Virginia University and her Master of Science degree in Space and Planetary Physics from the University of Michigan. She continues to remain abreast of the latest advancements by maintaining active affiliations with the Society of Physics Students, The Phi Beta Kappa Society, the American Physical Society, and the American Astrophysical Society.
Throughout her distinguished career, Ms. Blackburn excelled in various engineering and programming positions with ITT, Hines Industries, CharityUSA, the University of Michigan’s Radiation Laboratory, the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She also worked at NASA as a programmer analyst II, systems engineer, senior programmer, and analyst. Among her many achievements, she has the opportunity to oversee real-time data taken at the Savannah River National Laboratory and supported testing of satellite instruments, including the Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite for the National Polar-Orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System.
An expert in her field, Ms. Blackburn has contributed to various publications and presentations throughout her career, including “Ion Temperature Anisotropy Limitation in High Beta Plasmas,” “The Mode-separated Pulse Profiles of Pulsar Radio Emission,” “Exams in Atomic and Molecular Spectroscopy” and “A Search for Dwarf Novae in Globular Cluster 47 Tucanae.”
Ms. Blackburn dedicates this honorable recognition to her mother, Brigitte Blackburn, whom she thanks for her continuing love and support.
To learn about NOAA Satellite Operations Facility, please visit https://www.ospo.noaa.gov/Operations/satellite_operations.html.
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