Congratulations to Justin Pflug, a recipient of a 2025 NASA Agency Honor Award. Pflug
received an Early Career Achievement award, a prestigious honor that recognizes “unusual and
significant performance during the first ten years of an individual’s career in support of the
NASA mission”.
Dr. Justin Pflug is an Assistant Research Scientist with the University of Maryland Earth System
Science Interdisciplinary Center (ESSIC) and the Hydrological Sciences Laboratory at NASA
Goddard. He joined ESSIC and NASA in 2022 after earning his PhD in Civil and Environmental
Engineering from the University of Washington in 2021. His research focuses on modeling and
remote sensing of seasonal snow, with a focus on data assimilation in mountainous landscapes.
In addition to his modeling and remote sensing backgrounds, Pflug has supported multiple field
data campaigns, including NASA’s SnowEx multi-year field experiment. As part of his role, Dr.
Pflug served as a mentor for NASA’s Minority University Research and Education Project
American Indian and Alaska Native STEM Engagement program (MAIANSE), and supported
the US Fish and Wildlife on species status assessments for snow-adapted wildlife species.
In September 2024, Pflug gave a seminar on “Advancing Seasonal Snow Estimates by
Combining Models With NASA, Commercial, and Hypothetical Snow Remote Sensing”.
Congratulations, Justin!
