page_title: List of Puerto Ricans in the United States Space Program
section_title: Miguel Roman
hierarchical_section_title: List of Puerto Ricans in the United States Space Program / Miguel Roman
caption_attribution_description: English: Dr. Miguel O. Román
context_page_description: This is a list of notable Puerto Rican scientists involved in the United States Space Program, also known as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and their contributions to said program. This list is not limited to Puerto Ricans born in Puerto Rico, it also includes people of Puerto Rican descent born elsewhere. According to an article written by Margarita Santori Lopez for the official newspaper of the University of Puerto Rico's Mayagüez Campus, "Prensa RUM", as of 2003, of the 114 Hispanics working at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, 70 were Puerto Ricans or of Puerto Rican descent.
  Puerto Ricans and people of Puerto Rican descent, both men and women, have reached top positions in NASA, serving in sensitive leadership positions. On May 6, 2004, Joseph M. Acaba became the first person of Puerto Rican heritage to be named as a NASA astronaut candidate, when he was selected as a member of NASA Astronaut Training Group 19. On an average, only the top 4% of the qualified applicants are selected as finalists, and are invited to the Johnson Space Center in Houston for interviews for a position in the Astronaut Candidate Class.
context_section_description: Earth System Scientist
  Miguel Román, is a research physical scientist with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). A major focus of Román's work is the quantification of uncertainty in long-term satellite measurements of the Earth's surface at both moderate and high spatial resolutions. Román has developed a combination of global quality assessment and validation techniques that include visible, near-infrared, and multi-angular imagery and measurements acquired from in-situ and airborne platforms. His efforts to improve narrowband reflectance anisotropy models to estimate the Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function (BRDF) of land surfaces have led to major advancements in the estimation of terrestrial essential climate variables routinely used to monitor human activity and natural disturbances from satellite platforms. As a lead member of the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite  (VIIRS) Land Discipline teams, Román's research has enabled scientists to quantify how much of the variations in satellite observations are due to sensor performance, terrain, and/or geometry (view angle) effects; a critical factor when the satellite data are used to drive policy related to global climate change. Most recently, Dr. Román's research has focused on capturing seasonal variations in nighttime lights using measurements from the VIIRS Day/Night Band on Suomi-NPP.
caption: Miguel O. Roman
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