Travis Shane Taylor was born in Decatur, Alabama on July 24, 1968. His father, Charles Taylor, worked for Wyle Laboratories, as a machinist, who subcontracted with NASA in the 1960s building America’s first satellites with Wernher von Braun. At 17, Travis built a radio telescope that won the state science fair, placing 6th in the nation.
This led the Army to offering him a job at Redstone Arsenal on direct energy weapons systems. To stay busy, Travis is a black belt martial artist, a private pilot, a scuba diver, races mountain bikes, competed in triathlons, and has been the lead singer and rhythm guitarist of several hard rock bands.
He has degrees from Auburn University and the University of Alabama including doctorates in optical science and engineering, a master’s degree in physics, a master’s degree in aerospace engineering, a master’s degree in astronomy, and a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering.
For over 16 years he has worked for the United States Department of Defense and NASA. Travis has worked on advanced propulsion concepts, very large space telescopes, space-based beamed energy systems, high-energy lasers, and next-generation space launch concepts.
Taylor is also involved with multiple Human intelligence (HUMINT), Imagery intelligence (IMINT), Signals intelligence (SIGINT) and Measurement and signature intelligence (MASINT) concept studies.
He’s written and published 14 science fiction novels, two textbooks, and a number of technical papers. Starting with Warp Speed in 2004, he wrote sequels for his first book, most of which ranked high in a number of different polls. His latest publication, Saving Proxima, is set for release in August 2021. Other books are The Quantum Connection, Von Neumann’s War, An Introduction to Planetary Defense, One Day on Mars, Looking Glass War (books 2-4), Human By Choice, The Tau Ceti Agenda, One Good Soldier and Back to the Moon.
He has appeared, or had main roles, in many television shows like The Universe and Life After People for the History Channel in 2010, National Geographic Channel’s When Aliens Attack in 2011, Rocket City Rednecks-a show on National Geographic that focuses on engineering, 3 Scientist Walk into a Bar (2015), Ancient Alien (2017), The Tesla Files (2018), The Curse of Oak Island and In Search of Monsters (2019), NASA’s Unexplained Files and The Secret of Skinwalker Ranch (2021) .
