Charlene Booth

Charlene Booth serves as a key procurement professional at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, supporting the agency’s mission to advance next-generation propulsion systems and deep space vehicle technologies. She manages complex acquisition programs centered on research and development in physical and engineering sciences, overseeing contracts for high-fidelity propulsion testing infrastructure, computational modeling tools, and mission-critical systems engineering services. Her work directly enables NASA’s Moon to Mars architecture by ensuring timely delivery of advanced technical capabilities essential for rocket engine development, guidance systems, and real-time data analytics platforms. Booth’s acquisitions are strategically aligned with the Center’s technical priorities, emphasizing innovation, systems integration, and mission assurance. Booth maintains strong, recurring relationships with specialized contractors including Bastion Technologies Inc. and Aerospace & Commercial Technologies, LLC, both of which provide high-precision engineering support, systems integration, and advanced simulation services. Her contracting patterns reflect a preference for long-term, performance-based partnerships with firms possessing deep domain expertise in aerospace propulsion and space vehicle systems. These collaborations are typically structured as cost-reimbursement or time-and-materials contracts to accommodate the iterative, high-risk nature of developmental work, requiring close technical coordination and agile contract administration. Her procurement strategy prioritizes broad market access, with approximately two-thirds of her acquisitions issued as unrestricted competitions and one-third set aside for total small business participation under FAR 19.5. While she does not routinely utilize 8(a), HUBZone, or SDVOSB set-asides, her consistent use of small business set-asides demonstrates a deliberate commitment to fostering innovation from agile, niche vendors capable of supporting NASA’s cutting-edge R&D needs. Booth’s portfolio is exclusively focused on NAICS 541715—Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences—reflecting her specialization in advanced engineering R&D. She procures services including computational fluid dynamics modeling, propulsion system prototyping, thermal-vacuum testing support, and mission-critical software development for spaceflight systems, ensuring NASA maintains technical leadership in deep space exploration.