Dr. Edwin (Zack) Crues – NESC Academy Biography

Dr. Edwin “Zack” Crues has over 25 years of professional experience in developing spacecraft simulation and simulation technologies. Dr. Crues is currently a member of the Simulation and Graphics branch at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas where he leads the development of simulation technologies and the application of those technologies in the simulation of NASA’s current and proposed crewed spacecraft. He has developed hundreds of models and simulations for NASA spacecraft including Shuttle, International Space Station (ISS), Orion, Altair, Morpheus, and the Multi-Mission Space Exploration Vehicle. Dr. Crues’ recent research focus has been developing and applying distributed computation and distributed simulation technologies. This includes a large-scale distributed simulation of NASA’s proposed human space exploration missions. Dr. Crues also has international experience in developing simulations of European Space Agency launch systems and Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency spacecraft.

Dr. Crues is also involved in the advancement of modeling and simulation education.  He has served on a number industrial advisory boards for university aerospace programs. He is a co-founder of an interoperable simulation competition sponsored by the Society for Modeling and Simulation International. Dr. Crues has taught commercial and university courses in object oriented programming, modeling and simulation. He earned his bachelor’s degree, master’s degree, and doctorate in aerospace engineering from the University of Texas at Austin.