Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin (b. 1930) flew fighter jets in the Korean War and earned a doctorate from MIT on orbital rendezvous techniques, which earned him the NASA nickname "Dr. Rendezvous." As pilot of Gemini 12 in 1966 he proved that useful work could be done outside a spacecraft. Lunar module pilot on Apollo 11, he became the second man to walk on the Moon, which he described as "magnificent desolation." After leaving NASA he became a tireless advocate of human space exploration, above all of a crewed mission to Mars, and co-authored numerous memoirs and works of advocacy.