General Bolden is the 12th Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). At NASA, Bolden has overseen the safe transition from 30 years of space shuttle missions to a new era of exploration focused on full utilization of the International Space Station and space and aeronautics technology development. The agency's dynamic science activities under Bolden include an unprecedented landing on Mars with the Curiosity rover; launch of a spacecraft to Jupiter; enhancing the nation's fleet of Earth-observing satellites; continued progress toward the 2018 launch of the James Webb Space Telescope, the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope; and the successful launch and recovery of the Orion deep-space crew module, the first human-rated spacecraft to be developed for flight beyond low Earth orbit by any nation in more than 40 years. His 34-year career with the Marine Corps included 14 years as a member of NASA's Astronaut Office. He traveled to orbit four times aboard the space shuttle, commanding two missions and piloting two others, including STS-31, on which Hubble was deployed. After his final shuttle flight in 1994, he left NASA to return to active duty with the Marine Corps. He was promoted to major general in July 1998 and retired from the Marine Corps in 2003.