On December 6, 2021, NASA announced its next class of astronaut candidates, and former pro track cyclist and U.S. national team member Christina Birch, 35, was among the few selected.
We spoke with Birch after the announcement was made to learn more about her background in science, how track cycling has prepared her for her upcoming astronaut training, and what she’s looking forward to the most.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
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Bicycling: Well, first of all, congratulations!
Christina Birch: Thank you. Yeah, it’s… man. It’s such a shock. It’s awesome to be named to the class.
It’s such a big accomplishment. I know becoming an astronaut is incredibly competitive. I think I saw that there were over 12,000 applicants.
Yeah, it’s incredible. And to think that’s the reduced number after they’ve added the master’s degree requirement is unreal.
How much does this mean to you?
It’s fulfilling in a way I wasn’t expecting, beyond, you know, just the pursuit of a tough performance like in a race. This is also hugely fulfilling for me professionally, in my desire to continue learning in the engineering and science fields. Also, there’s this other critical piece, which I found in teaching, that I felt like I was really making a difference. And I’m so excited to be returning to a career where I can inspire people to pursue math, the sciences, whatever it is they are passionate about, and to apply myself alongside my classmates for the benefit of humanity. It’s that piece that is hugely fulfilling.
How long have you wanted to become an astronaut? How long has this been on your mind?
Well, it’s interesting because I have, since I was a kid, loved exploring. I grew up in the desert [in Gilbert, Arizona] doing backpacking trips, and our family pastime was whitewater rafting. So to me, that felt like being an old-school explorer, you know, navigating these rivers. And it really wasn’t until I was working in a lab, working with cells and proteins, and I saw that those same type of experiments were being done on the space station—I started to think, “Hey, I have those skills. Maybe there’s other skills that I could apply to, contribute to this program.” And the more research I did, the better fit it looked like for me. I really just wanted an opportunity, so I put my hand up and threw in my application the next time things opened.
When did you apply to the program? I imagine it must be a pretty lengthy application process with how many people they have applying to it.
The application was only open for a month, in March of 2020. There were some delays with COVID. But it wasn’t until the summer of 2021 this year that I had the first and then later the second interview. And the interview process itself was awesome. It was an opportunity to get to know my fellow applicants; some of them became my classmates. Even just over the course of a few days, while we were here [at Johnson Space Center] together, we started to work and bond as a team. And so now that we’re back, finally, as a full class, I’m so excited to see how that teamwork is going to build and progress through our astronaut candidate training. Yeah, I think good things are ahead.
Did you have to undergo any sort of tests?
Like you mentioned before, the selection process is incredibly selective, and so we had to undergo a bunch of different qualifications. That started when we first submitted our application. It was extensive, but a lot of it was also kind of fun. I had told myself that if I didn’t get in this time, I was definitely going to apply again, because I enjoyed the process and spending time at Johnson Space Center and around this community—I enjoyed that so much.
I was looking over your USA Cycling bio. It makes sense now that your favorite movie is Interstellar.
I forgot that that’s on there! Yeah. Yep.
How accurate do you think that movie is in portraying our actual situation with climate change? Do you think it’s too pessimistic? Do you think it’s fairly realistic?
I think it’s a movie designed to entertain. But, I mean, climate is an issue that NASA is taking really seriously, and it has a lot of science initiatives out there that are in progress. And we’re learning a lot. I’m excited to be a part of any missions that would help advance that research. There are a lot of experiments that are going on right now on current missions. So I think there are a lot of opportunities to be involved in learning more about what’s going on.
How important is space travel and exploration, and the development of that technology, to our future as a society?
I think it’s incredibly, incredibly important that we become, you know, an interplanetary species. It’s not only exciting from an existential sense, it’s also enabling us to develop technologies we’re going to use back here on Earth to make life better here. And the thing is, it’s an incredibly exciting time in human spaceflight. There’s a whole lot going on with a lot of different partners. All of NASA’s commercial partners are going to help us progress into the solar system and help give NASA more opportunities to advance the Artemis missions to return to the moon and then go on to Mars.
You have a Ph.D. in bioengineering from MIT. I have to admit, I don’t entirely know what bioengineering is. What did some of your studies and work in that field involve, specifically?
There are several different levels of engineering inside biology. I’m not on the medical side, the biomedical side. Biological engineering is sort of tinkering at the gene cell or tissue level and so on to try and solve important problems. My Ph.D. research focused on developing a new method to help us detect some critical proteins on the surface of a malaria-infected red cell, with a goal of being able to better diagnose and treat severe malaria. What I really loved about my Ph.D. work was how interdisciplinary it was. I was working with technologies that had to do with biochemistry, protein chemistry, microfluidics, and infectious disease, and all to try and help people.
And you were a faculty member at the University of California, Riverside, after you completed your Ph. D. program—for how long? Did you teach full time, and did you did you continue teaching throughout your cycling career?
I actually moved to L.A. to pursue track cycling. After I graduated from MIT, I put everything I owned in my two-door Honda Civic, drove across the country to L.A.—where, as you know, the only 250-meter wooden velodrome is. My goal was to represent my country. And once I got there, I wanted to continue progressing my bioengineering skills, and I was really passionate about teaching and sharing my knowledge. So I found the job at UC Riverside in their bioengineering department. I continued that for a year, and it was awesome. I had incredible students.
Then I moved back into L.A. near the track. And I taught at Caltech (California Institute for Technology) for a while, focusing on communication—again, to try and help people share their science, so it reaches a broader audience and we can get more people involved in STEM. So I was racing and training through all of those years. And I think it was in 2018 that I left Caltech to become a full-time cyclist with the national team, and we were traveling all over the world. I continued working remotely on the side; I did some part-time consulting work, because I have a lot of experience designing experiments, and then also writing grants to help companies procure funding to support their research.
Do you have a favorite or most memorable moment from your pro cycling career?
One of the really special moments was when I was racing the Madison in Brisbane at a World Cup, and we won the bronze medal—my first medal in the Madison. I looked up as we came whipping around after the final sprint, and I can see in Turn 1 my dad and my sister and Ashton. Getting to see my family and share their excitement—yeah, that was one of the most special moments for me.
In what ways do you think pro cycling has prepared you to be an astronaut?
I think the same things that drove me to be a good cyclist are the ones that pushed me to want to pursue an opportunity in human spaceflight. I was trying to be at the cutting edge of the sport, going faster than anyone had gone before in the team pursuit, and pushing my body to its limit. Very similarly, NASA’s mission is trying to advance human spaceflight and going further than we’ve ever gone before, learning how to live in space for longer durations. This was really just a natural extension of my interests in high-performance sports.
I figure with pro cycling, you really develop your mental strength and your physical strength, and I’m sure that will carry over well into being an astronaut.
Absolutely. I often think of the Madison, and how you have to make race-critical decisions in split seconds and communicate them to your partner. For the very brief moment that you’re doing your handing over, and to execute your race plan or your mission, there’s a lot of parallels there. You have to be very focused and think on your feet and think together as a team. I hope that those lessons will serve me well and make me a valuable member to my astronaut candidate class.
I’m sure you will!
I hope so. Man, these people are impressive!
Can you summarize what sort of training you’ll be doing? Is there anything in particular that you’re looking forward to? And is there anything that you’re not looking forward to?
I’m really excited to get started with all the training. Part of what attracts me to it is its diversity and all the different skillsets we have to learn. For example, we start off learning space station systems; we get trained in robotics; we get trained in Russian language; we get to train in the T-38 jets, which is super exciting; and of course, spacewalk training in the neutral buoyancy lab, which I am particularly looking forward to. I’ve been so excited to get started with the spacewalk training in the pool.
Unlike in cycling—where we’re trying to make ourselves as aero as possible by neglecting our upper bodies—I have been training my upper body extensively. I’ve put on like two kilos since I started training my upper body, doing pullups, shoulder work, working on grip strength, because that’s one of the things you have to be able to do to move the [space] suit. So it’s very different training, but I’m still trying to take a thoughtful approach to it.
Beyond training, what are you looking forward to the most? Is there any particular mission that you want to work on?
I’m lucky that I’m joining the astronaut class when I am because there are a lot of different opportunities—I will happily take any of them. Being part of the Artemis generation, I will get to participate in or support missions back to the moon, and that’s really exciting to me. You know, the potential of getting to wrench and build something on the moon is incredible.
This kind of segues into my next question, which is kind of a fun question. Do you have a favorite planet or moon?
Oh, interesting. I probably have a small affinity for Europa. Just because—I hope I’m getting this right—but I believe that’s the one that has the subsurface ocean with lots of cool potential biosignatures down there.
Is there anything else that you would like to mention or talk about that we haven’t covered already?
I just want to reiterate how much I feel like I gained from the cycling community, and how that helps prepare me to work hard and be a team player, which is going to set me up for success in my astronaut candidate training. I really hope that the cycling community will come along and follow me on this journey. It’s been a really, really special period of my life, and I want to include people in it.
When she’s not out riding her mountain bike, Jessica is an editor for Popular Mechanics. She was previously an editor for Bicycling magazine.
