• Brooke Owens Fellow, Class of 2021

• Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Aerospace Engineering, ‘22

• Host Institution: Ball Aerospace

• Mentor: Nicole Stott

• Brookie Mentor: Kaitlin Engelbret

Kat’s passion for science and exploration began at a very young age with a love for the ocean. Deciding to be a marine biologist, she pursued every opportunity she could, becoming an advanced scuba diver and conducting research on the effect of a widespread pesticide on the marine food web in her local university in Maine during high school. She continued to the University of Miami, where she worked in several research labs on wave dynamics, plankton oxygen production in the Deepwater Horizon aftermath, and larval fish response to ocean acidification. In 2014 she earned a dual Bachelor of Science in Biology and Marine science, and began work at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Miami, FL on the acoustics of marine mammals in the Southeast US. While at NOAA, Kat was responsible for the acoustics data collection and processing for several large vessel surveys in the mid-Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico. To date, she has over 480 full days at sea.

After working with acoustic instruments for years and itching for the opportunity to improve on our methods of studying the planet, Kat turned to her love for space and returned to school to complete a second degree in aerospace engineering in 2019. While at Embry-Riddle, she has thrown herself into projects, including the payload design for a sun-pointing CubeSat, avionics in a two-stage rocket for the SEDS chapter, and NASA Micro-G NExT Challenges which have twice been selected to be tested in the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory in Houston, TX. She is Vice President of the ERAU Chapter of American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics and the team lead for the 2021 Micro-G NExT challenge, designing a spacesuit tool attachment device. She has also interned with NASA Kennedy Space Center, working with ground support for assembly and recovery for Orion and the Space Launch System.

Being able to give back to her community is incredibly important to Kat. She has worked to tutor homeless people at the Miami Rescue Mission and has committed to work at Kristi House to end child sexual abuse. She also worked as a Guardian ad Litem for Miami-Dade county to support and advocate for children in ongoing dependency cases.

As a Brooke Owens Fellow, Kat is proud to join the engineering team at Ball Aerospace in Boulder, Colorado in Summer of 2021!