David Gerson
Principal Starship Engineer at Stanford Student Space Initiative
Brownsville, Texas, United States
Summary
👤
Senior🎓
Top SchoolDavid Gerson is a Principal Starship Engineer with nine years of hands-on experience turning research concepts into flight-ready systems and rapid operational capabilities. Currently at SpaceX leading efforts to accelerate Starship flight and recovery, he combines propulsion and systems engineering roots with program leadership across DARPA-funded projects and commercial launches. He co-founded and led the Stanford Student Space Initiative and scaled outreach through the Global Space Balloon Challenge, showing a long-standing commitment to building inclusive, practical space communities. At Apogee Research he managed P&L, mentored teams, and developed tools for compositional architectures that bridge ambiguous models and heterogeneous systems — a skill that translates directly to complex launch vehicle integration. Based in Brownsville, Texas, he thrives at the intersection of rapid prototyping, resilient system composition, and operational tempo. Colleagues describe him as someone who reliably turns messy, interdisciplinary problems into repeatable, verifiable flight outcomes.
9 years of coding experience
10 years of employment as a software developer
MS and BS, Aerospace Engineering, MS and BS, Aerospace Engineering at Stanford University
Github Skills (9)
tracks10
software-design10
kicad10
icu10
cad9
open-source8
weighted8
balloon6
python4
Programming languages (2)
Github contributions (3)
balloonchallenge/balloonchallenge.org
Apr 2017 - Nov 2020
The website for the Global Space Balloon Challenge
Contributions:43 pushes in 3 years 7 months
balloon
RespiraWorks/SystemDesign
May 2020 - Jun 2020
Mechanical, Electrical, and Pneumatic design. This project is ongoing and incomplete. We don't want to pretend the design is any more or less advanced than what it is. This is a complex engineering project that is the product of volunteer engineers. Please evaluate the project holistically weighted against your needs and our progress.
Contributions:9 PRs, 22 pushes, 7 branches in 1 month
pneumaticpythonevaluateongoingmechanical
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