Chair, Goddard Senior Fellows, NASA GSFC

Dr. Henning Leidecker works as a Failure Analyst at NASA Goddard, where he maintained the NASA Tin Whisker Homepage from 2004-2012. He attended the Catholic University of America, earning his BA in 1963 and a PhD in 1968. As a physics professor at The American University (1967 – 1985), he taught courses in Thermodynamics, Statistical Mechanics, Classical Mechanics, Quantum Mechanics, Electricity & Magnetism, Solid State Physics, and Methods of Mathematical Physics, among others. At Goddard Space Flight Center, he worked in the Materials Branch from 1985 to 1996, in the Assurance Technologies Division from 1996 to the GSFC reorganization, and has been in Code 562 to present.

While at Goddard, Dr. Leidecker has received several awards, including the QASAR Award for Safety & Mission Assurance for contributions to the safety of NASA programs for 1999 and again for 2000; the Robert C. Baumann Memorial Award For Contributions to Mission Success; the Flight Awareness Award; a NASA Agency Exceptional Service Medal in 2003; a NASA Agency Outstanding Leadership Award for 2004 and a GSFC Award of Merit in 2004, and in 2005, a NASA Agency Exceptional Engineering Achievement Medal. Dr. Leidecker was awarded a patent for the manufacturing of nanotubes in 2004.