Joshua Colwell

Joshua Colwell is a Planetary Scientist and Professor of Physics at the University of Central Florida, author, actor and host and producer of the astronomy podcast "Walkabout the Galaxy". He is the Director of the Center for Microgravity Research and Assistant Director of the Florida Space Institute at UCF. He earned his Ph.D. in Astrophysical, Planetary and Atmospheric Sciences from the University of Colorado.

His research interests are in the origin and evolution of the solar system with a particular emphasis on planet formation, asteroids, planetary rings, comets, and interplanetary dust. He worked on the Cassini mission to Saturn since 1990. His experiments have flown on the Space Shuttle, the International Space Station, suborbital rockets, parabolic airplane flights, and he is developing a CubeSat to study collisions in the protoplanetary disk.

An avid Trekkie, his other interests include running, writing and movies. He was a comet advisor for, and actor in, the Dreamworks picture “Deep Impact”. The years have taken their toll, though, as his most recent appearance on screen was as a walker in "The Walking Dead".