Sarah Brothers

Director, Commercial Remote Sensing Regulatory Affairs Division
NOAA, U.S. Department of Commerce

Dr. Sarah C. Brothers is the Director of the Commercial Remote Sensing Regulatory Affairs Division within the Office of Space Commerce. The mission of her division is to regulate the operation of private Earth remote sensing space systems, subject to the jurisdiction or control of the United States, while preserving essential national security interests, foreign policy, and international obligations.

Dr. Brothers has developed and implemented national space policy in the commercial, security, and civil space sectors; and assessed impacts of emerging commercial space technologies on national security and regulatory operations. She has led teams synthesizing analytics to produce results employed in operational environments. She has applied these experiences to challenges in commercial remote sensing regulation, with the resultant products and advice informing regulatory and policy decisions enabling a more competitive U.S. space industry. 

Dr. Brothers was previously a project engineer with The Aerospace Corporation, senior analyst with the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory National Security Analysis Department, and staff officer with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) Space Studies Board (SSB) and Aeronautics and Space Engineering Board (ASEB).

Dr. Brothers holds a Ph.D. in geology from the University of Texas at Austin, where her research focused on remote sensing studies of aeolian systems on Earth and Mars. She earned her Bachelor of Arts in Geology from Bryn Mawr College.