Falcon 9 Booster Landing Team receives first Neil Armstrong Space Prize for reusable rocket research

WASHINGTON — Purdue University’s Neil Armstrong Space Prize was awarded to the SpaceX Falcon 9 Booster Landing Team, recognizing their globally impactful work on the Falcon 9 reusable two-stage rocket system.

The team is the first recipient of the international prize, which recognizes excellence over the past 10 years in space discovery, innovation and human achievement. The prize leverages Purdue’s unparalleled space heritage of having produced numerous astronauts and pioneering aerospace education and research.

The entire landing team was nominated for their work in developing the vertical landing capability of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rockets, fundamentally changing the launch vehicle landscape. The SpaceX recipients representing the Falcon 9 Booster Landing Team were: 

• Lars Blackmore, senior principal Mars landing engineer
• Shana Diez, senior director of Starship reliability
• Jon Edwards, senior vice president of Falcon & Dragon projects
• Yoshiaki Kuwata, principal GNC engineer
• Eduardo Velazquez, director of Crew Starship engineering

The award was presented to members of the team during an evening ceremony Tuesday (Sept. 15) at the Cosmos Club in Washington, D.C. The recipients were announced in April during an event in the Herman and Heddy Kurz Atrium at Purdue’s Neil Armstrong Hall of Engineering. Jared Isaacman, NASA administrator, participated in the award event Tuesday.

“Neil Armstrong’s achievement rested on extraordinary engineering, teamwork and the courage to attempt what had never been done before,” said Mark Lundstrom, the John A. Edwardson Dean of the College of Engineering. “The Falcon 9 Booster Landing Team carries that spirit forward. By making rocket reuse practical at unprecedented scale, they changed the economics of spaceflight and opened new possibilities for science, exploration and commerce. It is especially fitting that they are the first recipients of the Neil Armstrong Space Prize.”

The award honors aerospace pioneer and Purdue graduate Neil Armstrong (BS aeronautical engineering ’55, honorary doctorate ’70), who led the team of three American astronauts who were the first to land on the moon on July 20, 1969.

Known as the Cradle of Astronauts, Purdue has 30 alumni who have flown in space or have been selected as NASA astronaut candidates. Eight Purdue astronauts attended the award ceremony Tuesday.

Dan Dumbacher, chair of the Neil Armstrong Space Prize selection committee, said the reusability resulting from the vertical landing capability of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rockets has been key in reducing the cost of launching payloads. Falcon 9 last year had 164 launches with one booster being used more than 35 times.

“In the end, the deciding factor was what we felt like was the team’s impact to humanity,” said Dumbacher, a professor of engineering practice in Purdue’s School of Aeronautics and Astronautics. “Their work has had a very clear impact and a very visible impact.”

The SpaceX team was honored in the award’s innovation category and chosen from a long list of impressive nominees. Three categories of awards fall under the Neil Armstrong Space Prize, and each year one or multiple categories might be awarded:

• Innovation: for space technologies that benefit humanity
• Discovery: for breakthroughs that have most expanded the frontiers of human knowledge
• Human achievement: for a pioneering accomplishment in space that has most benefited humanity

Neil Armstrong Space Prize eligibility stretches internationally across the major areas of the modern space industry — including government, defense and commercial aspects — and the goals set by each area. Nominees were received in all three categories of the space prize in 2025 and were extensively reviewed and narrowed down to six finalists in January. The Neil Armstrong Space Prize advisory and selection committee members passed a final nominee recommendation to Purdue leadership for approval.

The Neil Armstrong Space Prize program is sponsored by Purdue alumni Paul and Florence Stahura.

Purdue leads all public institutions of higher learning for the number of alumni who have entered public and commercial space programs. Academic, government and industrial partnerships — including with NASA research centers and leading space economy industries — serve as a university hallmark with collaborative efforts that have resulted in advances in hypersonics, advanced propulsion systems, in-space manufacturing, and lunar and planetary surface mobility, which are critical to space discovery, economic opportunity and global security.

Nominations for the 2027 Neil Armstrong Space Prize are being accepted now through Nov. 1 at https://www.purdue.edu/space/prize/.

About Purdue University

Purdue University is a research institution ranked among the top 10 public universities in the United States. More than 111,000 students study at Purdue across multiple campuses, including more than 57,000 at our main campus locations in West Lafayette and Indianapolis. As a land-grant university committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue’s main campus has frozen tuition 14 years in a row, enabling more students than ever to graduate debt-free.