Michael J. Belton is President of Belton Space Exploration Initiatives and Emeritus Astronomer at the Kitt Peak National Observatory

Kitt Peak National Observatory

The Kitt Peak National Observatory is a United States astronomical observatory located on 2,096 m Kitt Peak of the Quinlan Mountains in the Arizona-Sonoran Desert on the Tohono O'odham Nation, southwest of Tucson...

 in Arizona. Belton served as the Chair of the 2002 Planetary Science Decadal Survey

Planetary Science Decadal Survey

The Planetary Science Decadal Survey is a publication of the United States National Research Council produced for NASA and other United States Government Agencies such as the National Science Foundation. The document identifies key questions facing planetary science and outlines plans for space...

 guiding NASA and other US Government Agencies plans for solar system exploration. Belton studied first at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland and earned his PhD at the University of California at Berkeley for his doctoral thesis on "The Interaction of Type II Comet Tails with the Interplanetary Medium".

Belton led the Galileo Imaging Science Team in high-resolution imaging studies of Venus, Jupiter, Jupiter's moons Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, Earth's moon as well as asteroids Ida, Gaspra, and Dactyl. The team also studied the collision of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 with Jupiter.

Honors

• Gerard P. Kuiper Prize in Planetary Science, 1995
• minor planet 3498, Belton has been named for him