Current Fellows and Alumni
Fellows
Curtis “Trey” Lowery III, MD, PhD
Curtis “Trey” Lowery III, MD, PhD
Dr. Curtis “Trey” Lowery III, M.D., Ph.D., was selected by UTHealth Houston as the 2nd Space Medicine Fellow and started his training in July 2023. Dr. Lowery has worked at every level of the emergency medical system, beginning his career as a scribe in the ED, then working as an EMT and participating in wilderness search and rescue and culminating as an Emergency Medicine Attending. He completed his Residency in emergency medicine at UTHSC Memphis during which he worked at an austere medicine clinic in the Philippines, undertook additional training in Hyperbaric medicine, and developed protocols to help protect providers while intubating patients during the COVID-19 pandemic. He has used his Biochemistry PH.D background to develop several patents in conjunction with the VA to improve therapy for heart attacks, strokes, and combat related hemorrhagic reperfusion injury.
Dr. Lowery is passionate about wilderness medicine, medical research, search & rescue, and the mission to make humanity a multiplanetary species. His hobbies include SCUBA diving, blacksmithing, hiking, canoeing, pickleball, racquetball, and trivia.
Sam Beger, MD
Sam Beger is the Third Space Medicine Fellow. He completed his medical degree and received his M.P.H. from the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix and completed Emergency Medicine Residency at UTHealth Houston in 2024.
Before residency, Sam worked with SpaceX at Cape Canaveral and Boca Chica, and was Vice Chief of Aerospace Medicine during residency.
He is interested in perusing a career in Emergency Medicine and Space Medicine and helping build a great future for humanity. Outside of the aerospace arena, Sam loves roasting coffee (he founded a coffee roasting company in Phoenix, AZ), playing soccer and riding his bike around Houston.
Alumni
Nicolas Heft, MD
Staff Physician
Fellowship Director
Nicolas Heft is an Emergency Medicine physician and co-founder/inaugural fellow of the UT Houston Space Medicine Fellowship.
Dr. Heft graduated from Florida Atlantic University College of Medicine in 2019 and completed his emergency medicine residency at the University of Texas in 2022.