Dr. Paul Abell is a planetary scientist assigned to the Astromaterials Research and Exploration Directorate at NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas and a research scientist at the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, Arizona.. He has been studying potentially hazardous asteroids and near-Earth objects for over 7 years. He was a telemetry officer for the Near-Earth Asteroid Rendezvous spacecraft NIS (Near-Infrared Spectrometer) team and is a member of the science team for the Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRS) on the Japanese Hayabusa spacecraft. Paul, his wife Amy Sisson, and their feline friends have lived in the Houston area since December 2003.