Helen Yamamoto is a Technical Program Manager in Hardware Engineering for Amazon Web Services in Seattle and has been a part-time Laser Spotter at the Lick Observatory since 2015. She spent the past year providing technical, operational, and program management support for 20+ Amazon Fire TV devices out of Lab126.

Helen is published for her undergraduate work with an instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope and several ground-based observatories around the world. She supported radiation-hard UV detector development as a Technician for the NASA ICON and GOLD Missions, later supporting payload integration, system testing, and Cape Canaveral launches for large commercial and military satellites as a Senior System Safety Engineer for Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company. Helen interned with the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum and the United States Department of Justice in Washington, DC and has worked for smartglass and self-driving car startups in the San Francisco Bay Area. She also supported the testing and integration of drones into national air space as an Analyst at NASA Ames and spent several years teaching K-8 astronomy classes in the SF Bay Area and Colorado.

Helen holds a Bachelor’s in History with a minor in Astrophysics from UC Santa Cruz, where she served as the Coach and Head Attorney for the JV Mock Trial Team and founded the UCSC Quiz Bowl Team. She has a second Bachelor’s in Physics and Astrophysics from CU Boulder, where she obtained her Machine Shop Certification, and also spent a year as a Visiting Scholar with the Office for History of Science and Technology at UC Berkeley.

When she’s not working or volunteering, you can usually find Helen hiking, traveling, doing martial arts, practicing meditation and yoga, enjoying music, or studying other languages.