My Life on Mars: Professor Colin Pillinger's unusual book launch

My Life on Mars: Professor Colin Pillinger's unusual book launch

My Life on Mars: Professor Colin Pillinger's unusual book launch

 

My Life on Mars: Professor Colin Pillinger's unusual book launch 

 

Early life

Pillinger was born on 9 May 1943 in Kingswood, South Gloucestershire, just outside Bristol, England, where he was brought up with his sister who was six years older.^[4] His father, Alfred, was a manual worker for the Gas Board and his mother, Florence (née Honour), was a housewife.^[2][4] He attended Kingswood Grammar School, and later graduated with a BSc and a Ph.D. in Chemistry at the University College of Swansea (now called Swansea University).^[4] He said of himself, "I was a disaster as a science student".^[5]

Career and recognition

Beagle 2

Pillinger's first job was for NASA, analysing the lunar samples brought back by Apollo 11;^[2] but he is best known for being the principal investigator for the failed Beagle 2 Mars lander project, part of European Space Agency's (ESA) 2003 Mars Express mission. It was Pillinger's wife who thought of the "Beagle 2" name for the project.^[2] The reason for the failure of the mission has not been determined, though a number of possible explanations were given by David Southwood, ESA's Director of Science. The commission inquiring into the mission's failure, however, apportioned some blame towards Pillinger's management of the overall project as a contributing factor in the failure.^[6]

Asteroid

Main belt asteroid 15614 Pillinger was named after Pillinger.^[7]

Speaking career

Pillinger worked as a conference and after-dinner speaker for the JLA agency.^[8]

Television

In 2003 Pillinger appeared on Top Gear as a participant in the "Top Gear Boffin Burn-Out!" challenge, with Brian Sewell and Heinz Wolff, to see who could do a wheel burn-out in a tuned 480BHP Nissan 300ZX. Pillinger won.
In August 2012 Pillinger stated that he was "annoyed" by how many technicians monitored Curiosity's successful landing on Mars because he only had four technicians for his own failed mission, Beagle 2.^[9]

Personal life

Pillinger's wife, Judith, is also a scientist and they met working in the same laboratory.^[2] They have a son and a daughter.^[4]
After experiencing difficulty with walking for two years, Pillinger was diagnosed with progressive multiple sclerosis in May 2005.^[10] He owned a dairy farm, but his illness prevented him from doing physical work on the farm.^[2] Pillinger also owned a pet dog.^[2]
Pillinger died at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge in May 2014, after suffering a brain haemorrhage and falling into a coma.^[11]

Awards

Chronology of qualifications, career, and awards:^[4]

• 1965 – B.Sc (Chemistry) from University College of Swansea
• 1968 – Ph.D (Chemistry) from University College of Swansea
• 1968 – Post-doctoral fellow, University of Bristol Department of Chemistry
• 1974 – Research Associate, Cambridge University
• 1976 – Senior Research Associate, Department of Earth Science, University of Cambridge
• 1981 – Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society
• 1981 – member of the British Mass Spectrometry Society
• 1984 – Honorary D.Sc (Chemistry) from University of Bristol
• 1984 – Senior Research Fellow, Department of Earth Science, Open University
• 1986 – Fellow of the Meteoritical Society
• 1991 – made Professor of Planetary Sciences at the Open University
• 1993 – member of the IAU
• 1993 – Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society
• 1993 – elected a Fellow of the Royal Society
• 1996 – Professor of Astronomy at Gresham College in the City of London (until 2000)
• 2003 – awarded a CBE
• 2011 – recipient of the Michael Faraday Prize^[12]

Bibliography

• My Life on Mars - The Beagle 2 Diaries (2010) ISBN 978-0-9506597-3-2^[13]
• Space is a Funny Place
• Beagle - from Sailing Ship to Mars Spacecraft (2003) ISBN 978-0-571-22323-7

Colin Pillinger

Colin Pillinger
At Jodrell Bank Observatory in 2009
Born	9 May 1943 Kingswood, Gloucestershire, England
Died	c. 8 May 2014 (aged 70) Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, England [1]
Nationality	British
Fields	Planetary science
Institutions	The Open University University of Cambridge
Alma mater	University College of Swansea
Known for	Failure of Beagle 2 Analyzing Apollo lunar samples[2]

Colin Trevor Pillinger, CBE (9 May 1943 – 7 May 2014), was a planetary scientist at the Open University in the UK. He was the principal investigator for the British failed Beagle 2 Mars lander project, and worked on a group of Martian meteorites.^[3]