Paul D. Spudis is an American geologist and lunar scientist.

In 1976 he earned a B.S. in geology at the Arizona State University. Following his graduation he performed an internship at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, during the Mars landing of that year. The following year he went to Brown University to study planetary geology, with a focus on the Moon. A year later he earned his Masters Degree and moved back to Arizona where he started working for Ron Greeley who had just joined Arizona State University. In 1982 he earned a Ph.D. in geology at the university.

After graduation he went to work for the U.S. Geological Survey. In the following years he spent in lunar studies and promoting the idea of lunar exploration. He became a principal investigator at the NASA Office of Space Science, Solar System Exploration Division planetary geology program. His specialty is in the study of volcanism and impact processes on the planets, including Mercury and Mars.

He later joined Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston as a staff scientist. Eventually he joined the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, and became senior staff scientist. He returned to the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston in 2008 and is currently a Senior Staff Scientist there.

Eddie Bernice Johnson (born December 3, 1935) is a politician from the state of Texas, currently representing the state's 30th congressional district (map) in the United States House of Representatives. She is the first registered nurse elected to the US Congress.

Johnson was born in Waco, Texas. She began her college education at Saint Mary's College of Notre Dame, Indiana and transferred to Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas, from which she received a bachelor's degree in nursing. She later attended Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas, and earned an MPA in 1976. She worked as a nurse in a Dallas hospital and later as a psychotherapist before entering politics.

She was elected to the Texas House of Representatives as a Democrat in 1972 and served for three terms. She was an administrator for the United States Department of Health, Education, and Welfare from 1977 to 1981. She was elected to the Texas State Senate in 1986. As a state senator, she was on the redistricting committee where she was instrumental in shaping the district she represents. By design the 30th Congressional District has a strong probability of electing an African-American and a Democrat.

Robert Zubrin (born April 19, 1952) is an American aerospace engineer and author, best known for his advocacy of the manned exploration of Mars. He was the driving force behind Mars Direct—a proposal intended to produce significant reductions in the cost and complexity of such a mission. The key idea was to use the Martian atmosphere to produce oxygen, water, and rocket propellant for the surface stay and return journey. A modified version of the plan was subsequently adopted by NASA as their "design reference mission". He questions the delay and cost-to-benefit ratio of first establishing a base or outpost on an asteroid or another Apollo Program-like return to the Moon, as neither would be able to provide all of its own oxygen, water, or energy; these resources are producible on Mars, and he expects people would be there thereafter.

Disappointed with the lack of interest from government in Mars exploration and after the success of his book The Case for Mars as well as leadership experience at the National Space Society, Zubrin established the Mars Society in 1998. This is an international organization advocating a manned Mars mission as a goal, by private funding if possible.

Donna F. Edwards (born June 28, 1958) is the U.S. Representative for Maryland's 4th congressional district, serving since a special election in 2008. She is a member of the Democratic Party. The district includes most of Prince George's County, as well as part of Montgomery County.

A lawyer and long time community activist, she defeated 15-year incumbent Albert Wynn in the 2008 Democratic primary, and, following his resignation, won a special election on June 17, 2008 to fill the remainder of this term. She was officially sworn in two days later on June 19, becoming the first African American woman to represent Maryland in the United States Congress. Edwards ran for a full term in November 2008, defeating Republican candidate Peter James with 85% of the vote.

She is working to help pass an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would effect a repeal of the 2010 Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.

Edwards earned her first degree from Wake Forest University, where she was one of only six black women in her class. After working for Lockheed Corporation at the Goddard Space Flight Center with the Spacelab program^{[citation needed]}, she attended and earned a law degree from Franklin Pierce Law Center in New Hampshire. Edwards worked for Albert Wynn as a clerk in the 1980s, when he served in the Maryland House of Delegates.