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About
Tom Markusic is the founder of Firefly Aerospace, the Texas-based small-launch and lunar lander company that put the Blue Ghost spacecraft on the Moon in 2025. He started the original Firefly Space Systems in 2014 after a propulsion career that included Director of the SpaceX Texas Test Site, Senior Systems Engineer at Blue Origin, VP of Propulsion at Virgin Galactic, and Propulsion Research Scientist at NASA. He served as Firefly's CEO through June 2022, directing the development of the Alpha launch vehicle and the company's NASA Commercial Lunar Payload Services contract. Markusic earned a Ph.D. in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering from Princeton University.
Previous roles
- CEO, Firefly Aerospace
- VP Propulsion, Virgin Galactic
- Director, SpaceX Texas Test Site
- Senior Systems Engineer, Blue Origin
- Propulsion Research Scientist, NASA
Notable work
- Co-inventor of U.S. Patent 11,333,104, covering liquid-rocket-engine cross-impinged propellant injection.
- Co-inventor of U.S. Patent 11,391,247, covering variable-depth liquid-rocket-engine cooling channels intended to mix propellant flow and reduce thermal stratification.
- Co-inventor of U.S. Patent 11,008,977, covering a liquid-rocket-engine tap-off power source for auxiliary systems such as turbopumps.
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