Prof. Amalia Ercoli Finzi
Recipient of Frank J. Malina Astronautics Medal 2012

Amalia was born to be a “Teacher”, and a “Teacher” she has been for all her life. For almost fifty years she has held Courses at the Aerospace Department of the Politecnico di Milano in Dynamic of Spaceflight and in Orbital Mechanics; several hundreds of students have benefited of her exceptional capabilities of capturing the attention of her pupils, for many of whom she has been a precious adviser not only in engineering matters but in problems of their everyday life.

Her scientific publications exceed one hundred and fifty, so many are also the Graduation Thesis she has supervised.

Prof A. Finzi has covered leading positions in several ASI and ESA Boards and Committees, including the Mars Exploration Task Force (NASA-ASI), the Human Spaceflight Vision Group (ESA), the Exploration Advisory Committee (ESA) and has participated to a large number of International Meetings dealing with Space Exploration, providing valuable contributions.

She has been Director of the Aerospace Department of the Politecnico of Milano, Member of the Scientific Committee of the Italian Space Agency, President of AIDDA- Italian Association of Aeronautics and Astronautics, President of the Association of the Engineers of the Provincia di Milano.

Amalia Finzi is Member of the International Academy of Astronautica, of the American Astronautical Society, of the British Interplanetary Society.

She has been involved in several past Missions of ASI and of ESA; recently she is the Principal Investigator of the SD2 Instrument of the Rosetta Spacecraft designed for the perforation of the Martian soil and the collection of samples to be returned.

Her many conferences have always received a very enthusiastic response from the audience that turns out to be captured by the clear and easy way she uses to introduce complex problems.