Filipino-American Engineer Gregorio Villar III is making the Philippines proud for being part of the NASA 2020 mission.
Villar is the Entry Descent Landing (EDL) Systems Engineer of Mars 2020 Mission and operations systems engineer in the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), who spent years of building and testing a system that will land Perseverance on the planet Mars.
Villar grew up in Baguio City until high school and studied at the University of California in college.
This week, the world celebrated after Perseverance Rovers successfully landed on Mars with the help of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) team of engineers.
Perseverance touched down the Martian soil from a hovering landing craft using a Sky Crane.
It entered the atmosphere at about Mach 28 (21,000 mph) before slowing down to Mach 10 (7,600 mph) while experiencing over 10x of Earth’s gravity. The rover is just the size of a car.
A key objective for Perseverance’s mission on Mars is to search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet’s geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet.
The rover will be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith.
As we celebrate the successful landing of @NASA‘s Perseverance rover on Mars, #DidYouKnow that #FilAm engineer Gregorio Villar III helped with its safe landing as the Entry, Descent, and Landing (EDL) Systems Engineer of the Mars 2020 Mission? Learn more: https://t.co/JrJNR6TL14 pic.twitter.com/DOhVEUJ0N9
— U.S. Embassy in the Philippines (@USEmbassyPH) February 19, 2021
