Federico Marocco

Federico Marocco serves as a Staff Scientist at IPAC (Infrared Processing and Analysis Center), operated by the California Institute of Technology for NASA. He specializes in brown dwarf research and contributes to the Near-Earth Object (NEO) Surveyor mission's data system development as part of the Survey Data System team.

Dr. Marocco earned his Ph.D. and completed postdoctoral research at the University of Hertfordshire, UK. He joined NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in January 2018 before transitioning to IPAC in May 2020 as a postdoc, advancing to Staff Scientist in October 2021.

His research focuses on brown dwarfs—particularly substellar companions to stars—which enable precise determination of age and metallicity. He applies brown dwarf atmospheric models to exoplanet characterization and develops astrometric calibration pipelines for the NEO Surveyor mission to detect potentially hazardous near-Earth asteroids. His work bridges observational astronomy and computational methods in the era of astronomical big data.

No scientific awards were specified in the source material.

Dr. Marocco collaborates extensively with mission teams including NEO Surveyor and CatWISE, supporting community-facing data archives that serve thousands of astronomers globally. While not yet advising graduate students as an early-career scientist, he mentors colleagues through IPAC's collaborative projects and contributes to NASA mission infrastructure critical for planetary defense and astrophysics research.

He operates within IPAC's interdisciplinary environment at the intersection of astrophysics and data science, actively participating in initiatives like the NASA Exoplanet Archive and infrared survey data systems to advance discovery in brown dwarf physics and planetary science.