John C. Mankins, MS, MBA
John C. Mankins, Chair of the Taksha Space Solar Power (TSSP) Institute for Earth and Moon, is President of Artemis Innovation Management Solutions LLC and of Mankins Space Technology, Inc. He is also Vice President of the Moon Village Association, and serves on the Boards of both the National Space Society and of SPACE Canada.
During his 25-year career at NASA and JPL, Mankins held numerous positions, including serving as Chief Technologist for Human Exploration and Development of Space at NASA HQ, where he received the NASA Exceptional Technology Achievement Medal, and created & managed the $1B per year Exploration Systems Research and Technology program.
He holds a BS from Harvey Mudd College and an MS from UCLA in Physics, and an MBA from Claremont Graduate University, and is a member of both the AAAS and the International Academy of Astronautics.
Mankins is best known for writing in the early 1990s the first detailed definitions of the “TRLs” – Technology Readiness Levels – and as the world’s leading expert in the field of “Space Solar Power”.
Selected Publications
Final Report from the MV 2020 Architecture Workshop. Available at:
https://