// About

Christina Kneis Wolfenden

Product and systems engineering. A decade of delivery at NASA/JPL.

What I'm Known For

Driving project success through systems thinking, technical rigor, and operational excellence.

For the past 10 years, I've operated at the heart of NASA's most ambitious missions: solving the right problems by developing deep context across the full lifecycle, solving them well with hands-on technical fluency from hardware to cloud, and delivering results by building trust and momentum across teams, leadership, and stakeholders.

Career Highlights

Mission Management
Mission Manager
Lunar Flashlight
Navigated a significant propulsion anomaly in-flight, protected scientific return, and championed innovation under pressure.
Mission Operations
Systems Engineer
Mars 2020, INCUS, MRO, Europa Clipper
Led mission-level system design and planning, orchestrated cross-team coordination, resolved high-stakes anomalies and built secure, scalable tools and infrastructure.
Ground Data Systems
GDS Engineer
MRO, INCUS Constellation
Built ground data system infrastructure for handling mission telemetry, managed system readiness, cyber compliance, and system resilience.
Research
Subject Matter Expert
Miniature IMUs
Published original research on long-term behavior of miniaturized IMUs in deep-space environments.

Education

M.S.
Product Dev Systems Eng
USC
2024
B.S.
Mechanical Engineering
USC
2017

Recognition

10
NASA/JPL Awards
6
Missions Recognized

Recipient of multiple NASA Voyager, Honors, Group Achievement, and Directorate awards spanning Europa Clipper, Lunar Flashlight, Mars 2020, NEA Scout, and MRO. Consistently recognized for leadership, outstanding engineering analysis, dedication, and innovative problem-solving in mission-critical environments.

View Full Awards List