Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology

Research Scientist, Earth and Space Science

Research Scientist

About

Dr. Essam Heggy is a Research Scientist in geophysics in the Radar Science Group (334H) at JPL and an associate faculty member at the Geological and Planetary Science Department in the California Institute of Technology. His research focuses on understanding the electromagnetic properties of terrestrial and planetary surfaces and mapping surface and subsurface hydrological and volcanic structures in terrestrial and planetary environments. He is currently the JPL Investigation Scientist for MARSIS instrument aboard the Mars Express, Co-Investigator on the CONSERT radar instrument aboard the Rosetta mission, and Co-Investigator on the Mini-SAR instrument aboard Chandrayaan and the Mini-RF instrument aboard the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. He is a member of the project science teams of several proposed planetary and terrestrial radar imaging and sounding experiments including Desdyni, ExoMars and the Ganymede 2025 orbiter. Heggy serves as the principal investigator of the planetary dielectric characterization lab at JPL. He served as the chairman of NASA’s International Workshop on Low Frequency Sounding radars, has convened several relevant sessions in major international conferences organized by the American Geophysical Union and the European Geophysical Union, and he edited a special issue on sounding radars for the Journal of Geophysical Research. Heggy also serves as a panel member for several NASA programs including the PIDDP, PGG, EPO and Astrobiology programs. In addition to his research record, he has taught and mentored radar subsurface imaging classes at Houston University, Rice University, Paris University and the Institute of Geophysics of Paris (IPGP). Heggy obtained both Master and PhD in Space Science from Paris University in France respectively in 1999 and 2002.

Contact Information