A NASA scientist mysteriously died without any cause of death listed or autopsy sparking questions about whether he was part of a pattern of deaths tied to the US space and nuclear program. Michael Hicks, who worked on a myriad of NASA space science missions, died in July 2023 at the age of 59 and worked at California's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) from 1998 to 2022. He assisted on the DART Project, the Near Earth Asteroid Tracking Project, the Dawn Mission, and the NASA Deep Space 1 Mission. He joins eight other scientists or top officials who have died or disappeared recently. Monica Reza, JPL's former director of the Materials Processing Group, disappeared in June 2025 while hiking and has still not been found. Retired Air Force Gen. William Neil McCasland also disappeared in February, walking out of his home in Albuquerque, New Mexico, without his prescription glasses or phone. JPL astrophysicist Carl Grillmair was murdered on his front porch in February, and Frank Maiwald, another JPL scientist, died in July 2024 without explanation. Maiwald was a longtime co-worker of Hicks. Two nuclear workers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory vanished from their homes in 2025 under mysterious circumstances. Boston fusion energy researcher Nuno Loureiro was killed at his home in December 2025. Lastly, pharmaceutical researcher Jason Thomas was found dead in a Massachusetts lake last month after also disappearing several months earlier.