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Kathryn D. Sullivan (born 1951) is an American geologist and oceanographer, and a former government official and NASA astronaut, who flew on three Space Shuttle missions. Sullivan was one of six women selected in NASA Astronaut Group 8, the first group to include women. During her first mission, STS-41-G, Sullivan performed the first spacewalk by an American woman. On her second, STS-31, she helped deploy the Hubble Space Telescope. On the third, STS-45, she served as Payload Commander on the first Spacelab mission dedicated to NASA's Mission to Planet Earth. Sullivan was Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere and Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration from 2014 to 2017. On June 7, 2020, Sullivan became the first woman to reach the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench, the deepest part of the Earth's oceans. In September 2021, President Joe Biden appointed her to the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. (Full article...)