Dr. Kshitij Mall, India

This week on Aspiring Martians, Joe sits down with Dr. Kshitij Mall, an aerospace engineering professor at the University of South Alabama whose work sits at the cutting edge of propulsion, plasma-assisted flows, and extreme-environment engineering.

Kshitij is one of the minds behind Mission ShakthiSAT, a low-cost lunar transfer and micro-lander designed to make the Moon accessible to small payloads, universities, and student-led missions. His work asks a big question: what if space exploration didn’t require billion-dollar budgets to matter?

Joe and Kshitij talk about what it means to be an aspiring Martian while still firmly rooted on Earth, how propulsion research connects to lunar and Mars missions, and why education and inclusion are just as important as rockets when it comes to building our future off-world.

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