Other Professional Activities
Dr. Hamid K. Rassoul came to Florida Tech in September of 1988, from a two year NASA postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Texas and later at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. At the time, Rassoul was driven by dreams of space travel. He was working for NASA on construction and deployment of a space-based spectrometer that would ultimately made the trip for him. Decades later after coming to Florida Tech as a visiting professor, he regards with justifiable pride the space science team he built in the university. He has recruited some of the best minds in the business to join him, which in turn allowed him to build one of the finest research laboratories in Florida and the nation, Geospace Physics Laboratory (GPL). The university’s records show his unselfish commitments for all types of service activities: creating / participating in many interdisciplinary academic programs for all students, record of successes with mentoring graduate students and post-doctoral fellows, serving on all sorts of department affairs and university wide organizations, and making himself available to the public and professional communities. In addition to teaching and research, particularly in the physics of planetary lightning and cosmic ray physics, he served the university as a member of its administration as a department Head and a college Dean. He is currently serves the university as a Distinguished University Professor. Rassoul’s academic work in the past 35 years reflects his sincere devotion to be a university educator, in teaching, research, and service. His current research activities are in: X-Ray and Gamma-Ray Observations of Thunderstorms and Lightning; Initiation and Propagation of Lightning and Spark Discharges; Terrestrial Gamma-Ray Flashes (TGF); Solar Modulation of Galactic and Anomalous Cosmic Rays; Instrument Development; and Space Sciences Education.
