A family doctor who earned his undergraduate degree at Waterloo Engineering has moved on to another stage in the process to select Canada’s next astronauts.
Jesse Zroback made the grade as the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) recently whittled the number of candidates down from 72 to 32 after thousands of people from across the country initially applied for two jobs last year.
Jesse Zroback is shown in the pool during aptitute testing for potential astronauts.
Four graduates of the University of Waterloo made the first short list of 72 candidates announced last month, but only Zroback was selected to move on to the next round in the rigorous process.
“It would be extremely rewarding to push myself to my highest potential through the skills development and variety of rigorous challenges of astronaut training,” he wrote in a profile released by the CSA.
Zroback graduated from Waterloo in 2008 with a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering. He then completed a doctorate at the Northern Ontario School of Medicine, a joint initiative of Lakehead University and Laurentian University.
He now works as a family doctor in the Ontario community of Marathon, where his time is divided between an emergency room, a hospital and a clinic. He is also an assistant professor at the medical school he attended.
He cited The Martian as his favourite science fiction movie.
“Problem solving with limited resources on Mars is fun to think about,” Zroback wrote. “I also like to imagine the time when Earth might send astronauts to other planets.”
Waterloo Engineering graduate Martha Lenio, who earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering in 2004, failed to advance to the next round.
Also falling short were Waterloo graduates Francis Hane, who obtained a master’s degree and a PhD in biophysics, and Thomas Karakolis, who earned a doctorate from the Faculty of Applied Health Sciences.
The two candidates ultimately selected to become astronauts are scheduled to move to Houston in August to do basic training at NASA’s Johnson Space Center.