Mitchell Walker is the William R.T. Oakes, Jr. School Chair of the Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering (AE).

Walker has been an AE School faculty member since 2004. His primary research interests include experimental and theoretical studies of advanced plasma propulsion concepts for spacecraft. This includes a focus on Hall thrusters, gridded ion engines, and vacuum facility effects.

Walker directs Georgia Tech’s High Power-Electric Propulsion Laboratory. He’s also principal investigator and director of the $15 million Joint Advanced Propulsion Institute (JANUS), a multi-university NASA Space Technology Research Institute that develops strategies and methodologies to surmount limitations in ground testing of high-power electric propulsion systems. JANUS’s goal is to enable and proliferate the flight of high-power electric propulsion systems.

Walker is a fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and is the organization’s deputy director for Space Rockets and Advanced Propulsion. He’s also associate editor of the Journal of Spacecraft and Rockets and on the Editorial Board of Frontiers in Physics and Astronomy and Space Sciences – Plasma Physics.

He is a member of the Department of Energy Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee and a member of the NASA Advisory Council – Technology, Innovation, and Engineering Committee.

Walker is a recipient of the Air Force Office of Scientific Research Young Investigator Program Award, the AIAA Lawrence Sperry Award, the AIAA Sustained Service Award, and the Georgia Power Professor of Excellence Award.

Walker previously served as the College’s associate dean for academic affairs. He earned his BSE, MSE, and Ph.D. in aerospace engineering from the University of Michigan.