---
title: "Space, Wide Open"
date: 2021-10-08T05:30:00-04:00
author: University of Maryland
canonical_url: "https://today.umd.edu/space-wide-open"
section: Articles
---
# Space, Wide Open

*October 8, 2021* — by [Maryland Today Staff](/author/maryland-today-staff)


> Alum Who Helps Lead NASA’s Mars Exploration to Receive Hispanic Heritage Award

*Flightdirectordeployment 1920x1080 — Diana Trujillo '07 earlier this year celebrated the completion of a successful shift as flight director and the successful deployment of Ingenuity, the first helicopter ever delivered to the surface of another planet. Below, she spoke during a NASA Hispanic Heritage Month event in 2016 about Curiosity, a Mars rover on which she served as a mission lead.*

When Diana Trujillo ’07 immigrated to the United States from Colombia at age 17, a stumbling grasp of English didn’t shake her sky-high ambitions to join NASA. She delved into the language to prepare for college while working full time to pay for her studies.

It took nearly a decade of hurdling countless obstacles, but Trujillo made it happen: Today she's an engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory who has helped lead rover missions on Mars.

“If you want to achieve the big dreams—to really live on another planet—this is not going to be done by one country or city,” she said. “It takes everyone to do that, because we explore as planet Earth, together.”

Trujillo will be honored for her contributions to solar system exploration along with two fellow Latina engineers from the Mars Perseverance rover team on this evening’s PBS broadcast of the 34<sup>th</sup> Annual [Hispanic Heritage Awards](https://www.mpt.org/info/hispanicheritageawards/).


*Diana Trujillo gives presentation*



**Sidebar note:**

This is one of a series of Maryland Today features during National Hispanic Heritage Month celebrating Terp faculty, staff, students and alums.

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**Sidebar note:**

Watch Diana Trujillo ’07 and Latina colleagues from NASA being honored for their accomplishments on the 34<sup>th</sup> annual Hispanic Heritage Awards at 9 p.m. tonight on [local PBS stations](https://www.mpt.org/info/hispanicheritageawards/).





**Topics:** [People](https://today.umd.edu/tags/people)


**Tags:** [Alumni](https://today.umd.edu/topic/alumni)


**Units:** [A. James Clark School of Engineering](https://today.umd.edu/topic/james-clark-school-engineering)