Dorian McClenahan has a long-standing professional involvement with aviation and planetary space exploration, both of which inspired the Heaven Sequence. Beginning as a charter pilot in Florida and the Bahamas, Dorian continued his aviation career as an airline pilot based in Philadelphia. Bowing to an interest in the works of Dr. Carl Sagan, Dorian joined the NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) as an Operations Control Chief in the JPL Space Flight Operations Center, managing real-time spacecraft data operations for the Voyagers 1 and 2 missions to the outer planets, the Galileo mission to Jupiter, two Mars Rover missions and the Cassini mission to Saturn. His JPL career also included the development and implementation of technical training programs in JPL's Ground Data Systems network and enterprise business systems. During his time at JPL Dorian developed a keen interest in the scientific search for life beyond Earth, which also served as an inspiration for the Heaven Sequence. Dorian holds Bachelor and Master of Science degrees in Aeronautics from Embry Riddle Aeronautical University and a Doctoral degree in Adult Education Theory and program development from Arizona State University. His principle research focus was the degree to which space science degree programs in the nation's ten top universities included in their curricula the social implications of humans' ability to travel in space directly or via robotics. Throughout his career Dorian has been inspired by the works of Carl Sagan, James Michener, Herman Melville, Jack London, Robert Louis Stevenson and Polynesian anthropologist Christina Thompson.
