Rusty, an Apollo 9 astronaut, was the first Lunar Module Pilot on the mission. He co-founded the B612 Foundation with Ed Lu and others, and served as its chairman until 2011. He is the founder of the Association of Space Explorers (ASE) and served as president of ASE-USA. He also founded and chaired the ASE-NEO Committee, which, with its international Panel on Asteroid Threat Mitigation, produced and submitted to the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) the seminal report Asteroid Threats: A Call for Global Response.

Subsequently, Rusty also co-chaired, along with astronaut Tom Jones, the NASA Advisory Council’s Task Force on Planetary Defense. From the late 1970s, Rusty was named by California Governor Jerry Brown to serve as Assistant for Science and Technology, and from 1979-1983, served as Chairman of the California Energy Commission. Subsequently, he was founder and CEO of several space and Internet startups.