Brother Guy Consolmagno SJ is the Director of the Vatican Observatory. A native of Detroit, Michigan, he earned undergraduate and masters’ degrees from MIT, and a Ph. D. in Planetary Science from the University of Arizona. He entered the Jesuits in 1989 and joined the Vatican Observatory in 1993. In 2015 Pope Francis appointed Dr. Consolmagno director of the Vatican Observatory.
Br. Guy’s research explores connections between meteorites, asteroids, and the evolution of small solar system bodies. Along with more than 250 scientific publications, he is the author of a number of popular books including Turn Left at Orion (with Dan Davis), and Would You Baptize an Extraterrestial? (with Paul Mueller). In 2000, the IAU named asteroid 4597 Consolmagno in recognition of his work. In 2014 he received the Carl Sagan Medal from the American Astronomical Society Division for Planetary Sciences for excellence in public communication in planetary sciences. He currently serves as chair of the IAU Mars Nomenclature Task Group, and in 2025 will become president of the Meteoritical Society.