Michael Arida

Employer: ADNET

Job Description: System Administrator/Sr. Programmer Analyst

Phone: (301) 286-2291

e-mail: arida@milkyway.gsfc.nasa.gov

Mike received a B.S. in Physics in 1991 from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute [RPI] in Troy, New York. While still an undergraduate, he worked for GTE Sylvania in Towanda, Pennsylvania, conducting research into electroluminescent devices. He later worked for Grumman Aerospace in Princeton, New Jersey, assisting in the design of medium energy particle accelerators.

Pursuing a desire to see the world, Mike joined the U.S. Peace Corps for a two year stint teaching high school Chemistry and Physics in the small central African country of Malawi, home to the ninth largest freshwater lake in the world. He followed this with a 10 month English lecturer position at Academia Istropolitana in Brastislava, Slovak Republic.

Perhaps finally settling down, Mike began working at Goddard in August, 1995 working for the HEASARC, as a member of the ROSAT Guest Observer Facility. (GOF) and later the ASCA GOF, as well as coordinating exhibits for national and international astronomical meetings.

In 2005 Mike moved over to the dark side as a System Administrator for the NASA's Astrophysics Science Division as well as supporting the ESA XMM-Newton mission at the U.S. XMM-Newton GOF.