Aisha Bowe

Early life and education

Aisha Bowe grew up in the United States in a working-class family. Her high school guidance counselor advised her to pursue cosmetology, so she enrolled at Washtenaw Community College. While there, her father—who was also pursuing a degree in electrical engineering—encouraged her to take a mathematics course.

That class helped her build the academic foundation needed to transfer into engineering programs at the University of Michigan. She earned a bachelor's degree in aerospace engineering in 2008 and a master's degree in space systems engineering in 2009, both from the University of Michigan. During graduate study, she was mentored by professor Thomas Zurbuchen, who encouraged her to pursue a career at NASA.

Career

Bowe worked at the Ames Research Center in the Flight Trajectory Dynamics and Controls Branch of the Aviation Systems Division. She later joined the AST Flight and Fluid Mechanics group in 2009, contributing to the development of algorithms supporting air traffic management. In 2012, she received the National Society of Black Engineers award for Outstanding Technical Contribution for her paper 'Evaluation of a Fuel Efficient Aircraft Maneuver for Conflict Resolution'.

While at NASA, she served as liaison to the Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement (MESA) Program, mentoring students, leading workshops, and conducting NASA site tours. Bowe is founder and CEO of STEMBoard, which provides professional advisory services to organizations in the U.S. Government. STEMBoard was named to Inc. Magazine's Inc. 5000 list of the fastest-growing private companies in the United States in 2020 and 2023, and received the Nunn-Perry Award in 2022 from the United States Department of Defense.

In 2022, she founded LINGO, an education technology company that develops hands-on, project-based STEM learning kits and curriculum. In 2024, LINGO raised $2.3 million. LINGO was recognized by Inc. magazine in 2022 when Bowe was named to its Female Founders list, and the company's coding kits have been featured in WIRED, which included LINGO in its guide to the best subscription boxes for kids. In February 2025, Bowe was invited by the Bahamas Ministry of Tourism to attend a SpaceX Falcon 9 booster landing in the Exumas, in recognition of her work supporting spaceflight coordination and STEM initiatives in The Bahamas.

She is a speaker in the U.S. Department of State Speaker Program, delivering lectures on STEM education, entrepreneurship, and space in countries including South Africa, Mongolia, Kyrgyzstan, India, and Egypt.

Blue Origin NS-31 Mission

Bowe traveled with Blue Origin on the Blue Origin NS-31 mission on April 14, 2025. On the flight, she served as the science payload operator for a collaborative experiment with NASA's Translational Research Institute for Space Health (TRISH) and BioServe Space Technologies at the University of Colorado, Boulder, which flew sweet potato, tomato, chickpea, and Arabidopsis seedlings. The mission's goal was to genetically sequence the plants after exposure to microgravity and compare them to ground controls to better understand how crops adapt to space at the molecular level.

The study examined how microgravity and radiation affect plant biology to advance future space farming and food security efforts. During the New Shepard mission, Bowe operated two scientific payloads: one supported by NASA's Translational Research Institute for Space Health (TRISH), and another developed in partnership with BioServe Space Technologies, Winston-Salem State University, and the Brazilian Space Agency. She became the sixth Black woman to cross the Kármán line, the internationally recognized boundary of space.

She shared the mission with guests Lauren Sánchez, Gayle King, Katy Perry, Amanda Nguyen, and Kerianne Flynn. Bowe traveled with Blue Origin on NS-31, making her the first Black woman confirmed to travel with the company. In addition to contributing to science, Bowe carried symbolic items on the mission, including the personal American flag of Apollo 12 commander Pete Conrad, flown with permission from the Conrad family and the Museum of Flight, as well as a University of Michigan flag.

In a 2024 interview with ABC News, Bowe shared that she mentored a 13-year-old girl who is now an aerospace engineer working for Blue Origin on one of the same rocket systems on which Bowe flew.