Neil deGrasse Tyson
![Tyson in 2017](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/82/Neil_deGrasse_Tyson_in_June_2017_%28cropped%29.jpg)
From 1995 to 2005, Tyson wrote monthly essays in the "Universe" column for ''Natural History'' magazine, some of which were later published in his books ''Death by Black Hole'' (2007) and ''Astrophysics for People in a Hurry'' (2017). During the same period, he wrote a monthly column in ''StarDate'' magazine, answering questions about the universe under the pen name "Merlin". Material from the column appeared in his books ''Merlin's Tour of the Universe'' (1998) and ''Just Visiting This Planet'' (1998). Tyson served on a 2001 government commission on the future of the U.S. aerospace industry and on the 2004 Moon, Mars and Beyond commission. He was awarded the NASA Distinguished Public Service Medal in the same year. From 2006 to 2011, he hosted the television show ''NOVA ScienceNow'' on PBS. Since 2009, Tyson has hosted the weekly podcast ''StarTalk''. A spin-off, also called ''StarTalk'', began airing on National Geographic in 2015. In 2014, he hosted the television series ''Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey'', a successor to Carl Sagan's 1980 series ''Cosmos: A Personal Voyage''. The U.S. National Academy of Sciences awarded Tyson the Public Welfare Medal in 2015 for his "extraordinary role in exciting the public about the wonders of science". Provided by Wikipedia