NASA Scientist Swati Mohan’s Bindi Creates A Buzz On Twitter

LocalTop StoriesWorld
By Editor

Dr Swati Mohan emigrated to the US from India when she was only a year old.

On Thursday, as NASA’s Perseverance rover made a successful landing on the Red Planet, it was Indian-American scientist Swati Mohan who led the guidance, navigation, and control operations of the Mars 2020 mission.
“Touchdown confirmed,” said operations lead Dr Swati Mohan at around 3:55 PM Eastern Time (2055 GMT), as mission control at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena erupted in cheers. A video of the moment, released by NASA, shows Dr Mohan wearing a small bindi on her forehead – a detail that was quickly picked up on and became a talking point on desi Twitter.

Indian-American scientist Swati Mohan led the guidance and control operations of the Mars 2020 mission.

Dr Mohan emigrated to the US from India when she was only a year old. Raised in Northern Virginia and Washington DC metro area, she completed her bachelor’s degree from Cornell University in Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, and her M.S. and Ph.D from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Aeronautics/Astronautics.

The tiny bindi she wore generated a huge buzz on social media.


Many took to the microblogging platform to thank Dr Mohan for wearing a bindi, saying that they had been bullied for doing the same

Others called it a step towards building more diverse and inclusive workspaces

Although her bindi captured most of the attention, less obvious was Dr Mohan’s braid – the Indian-origin scientist got her hair dyed blue for the occasion.

Over the course of her career with NASA, Dr Mohan has worked on the Cassini mission to Saturn and GRAIL — a pair of formation flown spacecraft to the Moon, and has been a mainstay with the Mars 2020 mission since its beginning in 2013.

She says her interest in space peaked after watching Star Trek at the age of nine – and it only increased when she took her first physics class.

You might also like More from author