Rob Ferl

Director

Rob Ferl is a distinguished professor of horticultural sciences and inaugural director of the Space Institute at the University of Florida. He is an internationally recognized expert in the field of space biology, specializing in studying how plants respond at the molecular and genetic level to extreme conditions found on Earth and in outer space.

Ferl’s research has significantly advanced our understanding of plant biology in space. He co-directs the UF Space Plants Lab with Anna-Lisa Paul, a research professor of horticultural sciences at UF/IFAS. Together, they have launched 11 orbital experiments with plants on the Space Shuttle and the International Space Station, as well as five suborbital spaceflight experiments. They have also conducted six Arctic research campaigns to Haughton Crater in the Canadian High Arctic and two Antarctic campaigns to the Neumayer III Research Station on the Ekström Ice Shelf.

Ferl is the recipient of one of NASA’s most prestigious honors, the Exceptional Public Service Medal, which recognizes non-government individuals whose work has made a steady, lasting impact on the agency, its projects and goals.

As director of the new UF Astraeus Space Institute, Ferl is helping to develop a hub for scientists and scholars from across UF to collaborate, conduct research and innovate in space-related research. Through the institute, Ferl hopes to position UF to play a more prominent role in space exploration research in the state and beyond.

Ferl is also a national leader in the development of space research policy. He co-chaired a National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine committee that is charting the course for the next 10 years of biological and physical sciences research in space. The committee’s final publication, “Thriving in Space,” is a comprehensive analysis of where biological and physical sciences research needs to go in the next decade.