Mark Rober is an engineer and an inventor. He went to Brigham Young University and the University of Southern California. He studied mechanical engineering. He worked at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory for nine years. There he worked on Curiosity. It is a rover that went to Mars. He worked on the jet pack that lowered the rover to the surface. He also worked on rover hardware used to collect samples. He helped make JPL Wired, a wiki for sharing what people know.

Mark worked at Apple on product design in its Special Projects group. CNBC and Variety reported in 2018 that he helped Apple develop virtual reality. It was meant to entertain people riding in self-driving cars. While working at Apple, he kept making YouTube videos as a fun, creative outlet.

In 2011, Mark's iPad Halloween costume helped launch his YouTube channel. His first YouTube video got more than a million views. He used two iPads to make it look like he had a hole through the middle of his body.

Mark built a decoy package with four phone cameras inside that records what happens when it is opened. He has battled seed-stealing squirrels in his videos. He built an obstacle course to keep squirrels away from a bird feeder. He also filled a pool with Jell-O. He sneaks science into his big, silly builds.

Mark has given a TED talk called The Super Mario Effect about learning from failure. He says to treat failure like losing a level in a video game. You try again and figure out how to beat the level. He calls his habit of treating setbacks like a video game "life gamification." He also says he hides the science like vegetables. Kids click on a fun video, and the science comes along with it.

Mark started CrunchLabs, a company that makes kits for kids. Kids use the kits to build things and learn about engineering. CrunchLabs wants kids to learn to think like an engineer. Class CrunchLabs gives teachers science lessons for free. Mark wants kids to love science and engineering.

Words to know

• rover: Mars explorer
• Curiosity: a Mars rover
• wiki: a sharing site
• kits: things to build