Naylah Amara Canty

Naylah Canty began her aerospace engineering career at NASA’s Space Mission Analysis Branch (SMAB) in 2023 after completing her undergraduate education at MIT. 

She is a member of the Science Technology Utilization & Integration (STU&I) and the Extravehicular Activity and Human Surface Mobility Program (EHP) Systems Engineering & Integration (SEI) teams. Within the STU&I, she works with Katelyn Christein to coordinate science utilization needs across strategy & architecture offices, mission directorates, and Moon-to-Mars programs. This role also includes authoring and maintaining key documents describing objectives of the Artemis architecture. As a member of EHP SEI, she manages the ground rules for analyses performed to evaluate the operational and technological capabilities of the pressurized rover, lunar terrain vehicle, and the spacesuits.  

Previously, she has served as a research assistant for electrospray thruster propellant testing in MIT’s Space Propulsion Lab (SPL) and space technology road-mapping & campaign analysis in MIT’s Exploration Systems Laboratory (ESL). Through summer internships, she investigated safety protocol adherence and the Moon-to-Mars mission trade-space in the civilian aerospace sector first with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Office of Safety and Hazardous Materials and secondly within NASA’s Office of Technology, Policy, and Strategy (OTPS). Her multifaceted work at OTPS at NASA Headquarters inspired her interest in space-based solar power, a topic which she she researches as a part of an early-career concept development team.

Education/Professional Experience

• B.S. in Aerospace Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
• B.S. in Urban Studies and Planning, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)

Publications

• Canty, NS, “Orbital Settlement Design: Reformulating Recommendations for Planned Living Space within a Self-Sufficient Habitat,” MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning Undergraduate Theses, Jun 2023.